#the literal rings of betrayal and terror

[joogios]

Anyways, Zeke Jaeger had to sit down and realise that because of his decision at seven to turn in his parents as Eldian spies his dad essentially replaced him and Dina, went back to Paradis and had another wife and another son and on top of that he had to realise that after raising Zeke to be nothing but a pawn for Eldia, Grisha had gone and named his new son after Eren Kruger, the leader of the Eldian Restorationists, AND IF THAT WASNT BAD ENOUGH Zeke was probably aware enough to know that Grisha did that whilst being married to a woman who probably had no clue whatsoever as to who/what Grisha was and what the name symbolised.

[darlingofvalyria]

❝I am the Heir's Wife. I bore the Heir his lineage. I will not be swept aside.❞

[ The Prince Jacaerys Velaryon should have known his wife better— or at least, her ire, for when his trysts with the bastard Snow reached the Spiders and soon, the ears of his Princess Consort, rage and war drummed for Winterfell, demanding heads.

—Maestre Kevan, Volume IV of The Bastard Eater, passage chapter under 'The Flame that Sung for the North'. ]

[ +18 MDNI ] [ 10,062 ] [ series masterlist ] | jacaerys velaryon x targaryen aunt!reader (aegon's twin sister), one-sided aegon ii x reader, jace x sara snow

contains— canon divergence - manipulative reader, targcest, smut, angst - post-vizzy t death, rhaenyra is queen - mentions of children, pregnancy, childbirth - allusions to infidelity & character death(s) - targaryen madness, revenge, domestic violence (not jace), unhinge behaviour, intense use of 'bastard', profanity, gaslighting, guilt-tripping - this is basically gone girl, you gone girl jace - dark fic - mentions of depression (aegon ii), allusions to suicide (not reader) - nsfw: oral (f receiving), breeding kink, creampie - no kings, no martyrs, no betas.

a/n— i didn't think i was going to do the sara snow thing, but herewe are. also i just wanted an excuse to go absolutely ape shit. reader gets very intense, like thoroughly unhinged. this is literally me supporting women's wrongs. it is also quite insane that this reached 10k and it's still just the first part lmaooo + comment, reblog & like at will!

"THAT FUCKING BASTARD! THAT GODSDAMNED, WHORE-FUCKING STRONG HALF BREED!"

Your shrieks echo stone and shadow, interrupted only by the things you pick up and hurl. Anything your hands grab, you throw and spit obscenities against, rage and tears ruin your pretty visage. The fury swept past your cherub features, a dragon breaking through the Hightower seams, upending fire and roar from the pits of your being.

"HOW DARE HE?! I GAVE HIM AN HEIR! I BROUGHT HIM PEACE! I BETRAYED—" you roar, pulling your pearl dagger— a gift from your Strong Bastard of a Husband — and throwing it to your vanity mirror, glass shards exploding. "— MY KIN!"

"DAUGHTER, PLEASE!"

Arms wound across your torso—hardened and chain-mail — as you fight against your bounds before a pain flashes to your cheek. Your rage quiets, hard breaths from your lungs. You turn your tear-stained anger to your mother and her palm, fright and terror on her regale visage.

Death of a spouse becomes the Queen Dowager in her pale blue robe and unbound spirals of auburn hair. Peace had begotten a realm that is balanced on the lineage you had produced for the Queen, her heir, and your own, as the new Princess of Dragonstone. With Otto Hightower for evermore banished to Oldtown, Kings Landing had been brought to a flowering kindness.

Queen Rhaenyra's ascension had been a wondrous affair, fit the for the first crowned Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. Not a Queen Consort, not a Queen Regent. An heir who rose for the crown always meant to be hers.

But the calamity that brewed in her ascension... no. You paved the peace. T'was you who wrangled the Great Houses that proved allyship to your twin brother's banner, you who blessed her with tranquility of a rule that will be known for ages that will precede you all.

And now her son... her son dared to destroy everything.

A conversation floats above your head, by your Queen Mother and her sworn shield, the Ser Cole, but you barely hear anything past the ringing in your head.

The Targaryen Madness the sheep so call it, an idle voice, faint and familiar, whispers in the niches of your brain. It has infected you so. It breathes, fuelled by the air wrought by your husband's betrayal. It sings, sweet love. It sings.

"—your grace, I urge to hold her—"

"—she is my daughter, Ser Cole, I am not in danger. Release her."

Justice, the voice shrieks? Screams? But it is so soft in your head, a wail of a memory, a woman or a man? must be had. No dragon falls in such disgrace.

The tight wound over your torso is unleashed but the knight is not far, tensed to cage you, when your mother grasps your elbows as you grab hers, nails digging into the thick fabric of her hem that she still winces, your grip steel-tight.

"My darling, please. I cannot help you if you do not speak what ails you." She brushes her hand desperately across your face, smearing your tears, trying to find the daughter she bore past the savagery and madness that beholds you now. "What has happened?"

You draw a tightened, harsh breath to your lungs, rattling your bones that you quiver in your attempt for sanity.

"I am being shamed, mother," you whisper. Stark, violet eyes meeting the worried round, brown of hers. "The Strong bastard is whoring himself to another, a Northern bastard."

A cackle falls your lips as alarmed gazes are exchanged above your head.

"Y-You cannot say such things aloud, sweet girl," your mother hushes your madness, pulling you close to her chest as she shoots a glance at the door.

Criston checks outside, but only your maids linger. Dyanna presses a finger against her lips, catching the knight's eye, and the rest scatter, surely to make sure that no one that need not know of their mistress' words is within reach. A shiver still runs his spine. He will never get used to the quiet, almost non-verbal way your connection worked and reached. Your Spiders weave webs all around, even as their mistress sunders with rage.

"Mayhaps you are mistaken, for sure the prince is loyal, and he adores you—"

You pull back against her, teeth bared. She flinches and Ser Cole steps forward, wary. "It is the third missive now that I have received. Did you think I would not have confirmed twice— thrice? I didn't believe it the first time! But three people have now confirmed that all this time, in the guise of rallying his mother's cause in the North, he is spending ample time with the Lord Stark's bastard sister. His bastard fucking sister!"

Your mother's horror catches that of Ser Criston's, but your fury is your own, you are a dragon trapped in the ruin of your own making, of the webs you had spun so cleverly to get to this point, and you cannot stop.

"I am the Heir's Wife. I bore the Heir his lineage, my blood spilled the birthing bed for it." A cry leaves your lips as your grief and rage pools like ichor from your chest to the floor. Alicent is torn away from you— your nails had gone through her robe and she had cried in pain, a mimick of your own, a mother to a daughter to a mother to a daughter, a cycle, an Ouroboros — and you fall to the floor, grasping at your chest.

"I will not be swept aside. I will not be ignored."

A gasp falls from your lips as your mind moves to a quiet, still place. The tremble fades, your rage and grief whirls, collects, as you push it all back inside your chest.

Your madness must be sharpened for it be used as a sword.

And you cannot let him be happy in another's arms.

If you cannot drag them to the Hells, sweet dragon, the idle voice hums, hisses? Screeches. Your ancestors— all of those who have succumbed to dreamy madness — appears in the corners of your vision like soldiers. Awaiting for you to join them. Awaiting the blood that you will spill.

Then you must raise the Hells unto Winterfell.

"...my daughter?" Alicent calls, hesitant. Cole hovers but does not approach, standing guard in protection of the Dowager. It breaks her heart to see you this way, a young woman still, much older than she was when she married but only because you had always sought your future. You had always had a hardened scale, far stronger than she.

Even when you made your entrance to the world— the unmeasurable pain of bringing not one, but two heirs into the world, her firstborns, all at once — you had never cried. The maestres, maids, they worried for you, as your twin brother had not stopped crying, so alive and red, raw from the wound of being fresh.

But you... you had not made a sound.

The entire weight of your being— your mind, your emotions — even then, you wrangled them close to your very centre, never letting them stray too far from the edges of your fingertips. As if any release must be made with a perused thought. An incentive of reason.

Even then, you plotted every step you took.

Now, Alicent watches as her firstborn daughter suctions all her emotions— that Targaryen madness that plagued the blood of her husband, his ancestors — and made her ploy.

Against the husband that dared make a fool of her.

The silence beckons nightmare. Old fear flickers inside the Queen Dowager.

"Where are my daughters?"

"What?"

"My daughters," you repeat, a hair's breadth louder than the first time you spoke. Your eyes flutter upward. The deadened gaze curled Alicent's heart in fear. "Where are they?"

"In the nursery, with the twins and Maelor. Helaena and Aegon are watching them."

You offer your hand up mutely, and Cole exchanges one last, lingering look with the Dowager, before offering his own. You stand up, thank him softly, and brush and clean up your face to the best of your ability. An utter calmness over your visage.

"Tell no one of what I had told you," you say, fixing your hair and rubbing the red from your cheeks. One minute there is madness, the next there is nothing. There is only a girl. A woman. A princess. "No one knows apart the three of us, and if you ever decide, Ser Criston, that nigh is the glorious time for you to betray my mother or I, know that the last thing thing oyu will fear is the Stranger's hand when I am through with you."

Your mother shouts your name, horrified. "What are you thinking? What are you plotting?"

You cup Alicent's face, smiling ever sweet. "Your innocence will keep you safe, mother. All I ask, for the heart you keep for your children, that you keep this between sealed lips and tilted chin. You know nothing, yes?"

"... Yes. Nothing."

You place a tender kiss on your mother's head. "Keep Daenera and Aemma safe for me. Aegon and I are flying to Dragonstone promptly. Sweet Helaena does ever so get overwhelmed by watching all of the children by herself."

"D-Dragonstone?"

Your sweet smile touched with poison, stretches. "It is high time I take a dragon for myself, don't you think so?"

While an insecure obsession had fraught your younger brother about claiming a dragon, you had met it with indifference.

For how can you not mourn the loss of Aemond's sight, staring in quiet horror the entire time as the maestre did his best to salvage the muck mess of blood and nerve endings, before the old man had shaken his head, and you turned to the small bowl that contained your brother's eye, unable to look at anything else.

Not even when your mother's rage was met with apathy and anger, her demands for justice nothing more than a woman's insanity, a mother's grief that must be swept away, tucked under a chin and a sadness she will never get rid of.

"Do not mourn me, mother. It was a fair exchange. I may have lost an eye, but I gained a dragon."

Your soft-hearted, darling, baby brother. None of his words had thawed the freezing of your heart, the grief under the swell of your breastbone.

Your own mourning was kept between teeth and tongue, as you had slept with your siblings that night. The four of you, tucked under the wing of the other, Aemond close to your chest as possible, as quiet, hot tears ran down your face. Every moan of pain or whimper he made in his sleep tore at each new vein inside of you.

"Dragons are the symbol of our House's power," Aegon had once said, windswept hair you tried to tame with your fingers, smelling fresh of Sunfyre and winds.

"And yet, there were no eggs in our child beds." He stiffened while you smiled sadly, curling your twin's hair away form his face, making him presentable and dusting the bout of sand that managed to find his leathers. You had been scolded long before by your grandsire of how you coddle Aegon, how you defend him, mother him more than your mother ever could, but you cannot stop. You were meant to care for him, tethered you once were inside your mother's womb together, you hold him steady now.

Whenever he was lost, whenever his sadness overtook him, wrung your brother dry of life, you bat the Stranger's hand and bring him back.

"But we have proved them wrong," he insisted. "All of us, even Aemond with Vhagar— the war queen, Visenya's dragon — we have claimed ours. Daeron all the way Oldtown has Tessarion, even Helaena has Dreamfyre. And yet you insist..."

You wound your arms over his torso, keeping him close in a silly hug where you sway and dance him around. A laugh escaped him while you inhaled the scent of smoke, soot, and that grime stench of beast.

Aegon on his good days lacked the bottle-edge of wine, of cheap salts from the waft of the soiled, Silk Streets.

This was your brother. No one else.

"I fare better without one," you whispered in his ear. "I appear innocent, sweet almost, without a beast in my command. They look at me with nothing but pity and the urge to protect me. Our father likes me like this, his poor, lovely daughter without a dragon of her own, listening so intently to his histories of Old Valyria. Our sister is eased, as one daughter is plagued by dreams and struggles with the real world, while the other cannot even claim a dragon of her own. Poor princess, Hightower blood must have thickened in her veins. She too, is no threat."

You pulled back, smiling at him. "They like me better like this. Pitiful, compliant, nothing but a sweet and pretty flower that sways in the Spring breeze. A beautiful decoration but no more."

He rubbed a thumb on your arm, a worry knot on his forehead. Aegon adored you but he struggled to piece together where your plot lies. You are a web-spinner, forever dancing out of reach, catching prey and lengthening your intricacies. "Is that why you hide your training with Aemond alone? Ser Criston is mother's sworn shield, he would not mind—"

"I will not place my secrecies to a knight with a soiled cloaked," you snorted. "No matter how tall he stands beside our mother. I trust no one but my kin. And I know that no matter how heavy you drink, sweet Aeg of mine, my secrets are your own."

He took your hand, kissing the back of it, stare impregnable. "As your blood is my own, our fire is one flame. I go where you tell me to."

You kissed his cheek, a reward, laughing. He smiles proudly at the sound. At this time, you dangled yourself to your brother as bait as the pressure from your grandsire to make him King started rising. You had been given notice that he had been talking to House Lannister, Wylde, even some Riverland lords.

You did not mind becoming Aegon's second wife. Just as his namesake, he will have his Rhaenys and Visenya. Unlike the Conqueror however, he would adore his Visenya more than a true flower. Helaena would enjoy that far better.

"And if I tell you to jump?" you half-purred.

"I will ask you how high."

Memories and choices break and tide as you scramble for hold on the rocky cliff face. Dragonmont in the dark is a behemoth beast, a screech or two breaking like lightning crackles, or the familiar drum beat of wings before the silence consumes once more. The stench of fire, of beasts and carcasses helps cloak the darkened night.

"Udligon ñuha brōzagon, Answer my call," you hiss into fraudulent emptiness, hands gripping rocky edges until your blood beads, "you fucking lizards."

"Have you gone mad!?"Aegon shouted, trying to pace with your run to the dragonpit.

A rocky laugh broke out from your being, not deigning that with a reply. Aegon huffed angrily.

"Alright, tell me this then. How are you so sure I'm not just about to put you on a bleeding volcano to die? We claim your dragon in the morn, sister. First thing before we break our fast. I'm sure by then, Vermithor or—"

You whipped your head around, pulling halt. "I leave tonight to claim my dragon. Whether it is you and Sunfyre who gets me there, or Aemond and Vhagar, is no matter to me. I will claim one tonight. It is up to you to decide now if we tell Aemond or not."

Aemond, whose anger is wounded tight, the barest excuse for war always at the edge of his hum. The misstep at Storm's End had cost him everything. Had cost your mother everything. Queen still, Alicent Hightower had bent the knee and offered her life in exchange for mercy. Before Rhaenyra passed judgement, Viserys I had passed.

It didn't matter that you had ensured a higher dosage from the Harrenhal witch in his usual milk of the poppy. Your spiders moving with ease through the silent channels you had established long before your own flowering.

The Red Keep had scrambled, the Heir with it. It was enough time for Lucerys to have come out of the red, confirmed to live through the worst of it without as much as a broken bone. Arrax however, had been badly maimed, and would no longer take flight. But he and his rider would live. Aemond would live. Alicent would have her son. Rhaenyea will have hers, and the crown.

Kevan had done his duty unto you while you settled the storms in Dragonstone. You rewarded him handsomely.

Aegon sighed. He too, would like your honour avenged, but not for the sake of war. "As you wish, sister. I hope you know what you're doing and I am not about to send you to your death."

Just like what you did to your mother, you reached forward and cupped his face. If before, your touch stills his heart and floods his cavities with warmth, a flash of fear strikes the twin son at the eerie smile on your face.

"Skoros morghot vestri? What do we say to the god of death?"

Aegon blinked. "Tubī daor. Not today."

You smiled. "Trust me, sweet Aeg. It is not my death the Stranger will take. Not until the fjords of the North are at my mercy."

"Iksan kesīr sir naejot māzigon ñuha sikagon pakto! I am here now to claim my birth right!" Your scream echoes and falls, repeating back to you. There is a hum, like an electric current that sizzles and pops inside your blood and marrow, and you scramble higher and higher on the rock. Your blood does not sing for the dragon lairs, but above. Up and up, jagged edges cut your skin and dress, the wind whipping with sea mist, but nothing, no one, can clamour you as you reach the peak.

At first you see nothing but darkness and hollow sounds. But you let your eyes adjust, a hiss breaking out of your dry lips as you stumble. You look down. What you first thought were rocks and wayward bones of cattle is bigger.

Whale? No.

Dragon. Dragon bone.

You look and will every sense that your eyes do not. The smell that is drowned— iron. Bones bigger than a person. Than cows and whales. Bones of fearsome beasts. Darkness moves, taking form, more than shadow. Scales hewn rough and jagged, as if stone themselves. Midnight black moving with the gentlest of sighs.

As soon as you realise what— or who — is in front of you, the eyes open with an intelligent gleam. Your heart jolts at the emerald irises that gaze back at you, slitting at the appearance of a human.

'The stench of death follows him', the voice of an old keeper hums into your ear. You no longer remember who told this to you, but the words ring true in your memory. 'Scales of midnight, as if hewn from darkness and death. A harbinger, your grace, an omen of the darkest nightmares.'

"Rytsas. Hello." You smile, ever sweet, ever charming.

This is a thread you had never felt before. Not one of your own making, but something older. A golden thread that led the eyes of Daenys the Dreamer. That spun the ties of Aegon the Conqueror. The voices that herded your madness had gone quiet in the mad rush to get here, but now their presence thickens. Words you cannot hear, nor understand, flood the silence as dragon met rider for the first time.

Keepers and historians have called him he, but every bone in your body tells you that the being before you is a she.

And wouldn't that make sense? A cannibalistic being is a woman?

She opens her maw, only ever slightly, smoke and fire crackling out of it. Molten lava in the belly of her insides tease the cool, night air and warms you.

Her version of a smile. Hello, she seem to say.

"Māzīs. Come," you say, giggling. "Dohaerās. Serve."

That night, you took your first flight.

That night, the Cannibal took her first flight with her first— and only — rider as well.

❝ . . . It is said that the formerly named "The Cannibal" had been entranced by the hunger of his new— first and evermore — rider. Prince Aegon the Elder who had escorted his twin sister that very night with Sunfyre, had looked up in alarm and fright to a maddened screech. Excitement and laughter pouring out from the newly bonded Dragon and Rider had soon turned fear into awe.

Gaelithox, she had been named as they had ridden until dawn broke by the rider who loved her 'till the end of their days, was said to have seen a mirror in Her Grace. The fathomless hunger for blood and organ from the same bodies of their kin. For Gaelithox ever hungers and satisfies for the same meat as her, at the height of her grief and ire that fuelled the Queen Consort to climb Dragonmont by hand, she too hungered for the throats of her traitorous blood.

Gaelithox will only have one rider in her whole life, as she found no same twin soul as akin in the Bastard Eater Queen. Their bond moved as if two bodies beheld one soul.

She shied from humans, and oft found too rough with other dragons. Vhagar was an exception, oft seen acting as an elder sister to the Queen's dragon when neither royal rode them and played in the skies. Smaller dragons were forbidden to approach her however, nor was she allowed in the dragonpit after almost devouring the flightless Arrax.

She died two moons after the Queen's death, delivering her final flames for her rider and would never more breathe her infamous green flames akin to Wildfire, ordered by the Crowned Heir, Princess Daenera Velaryon. It is said that the princess attempted to bond with the cannibalistic dragon but it refused.

The dragon spent her last moons in heartbreak, oft seen in Dragonstone and the Red Keep, circling her rider's most favourite places. Her final resting place is at the very top of Dragonmont from whence the Queen claimed her. It is said that the Queen's crown, the one the King Jacaerys had gifted her after the birth of their first sons, the Princes Laenor and Gaemon, is said to be placed there, as well as a portion of her ashes.

It is said that the King and the Queen's twin brother, the Prince Aegon, personally made the trek in remembrance.

It is widely suspected that Aelyx, Princess Daella's dragon, the youngest child of the King and Queen, may have been Gaelithox's only existing hatchling for he too is made of rough, midnight scales. The dragon that bred with her remains to be unknown. ❞

—Maestre Kevan Noratz, Volume X of The Life and Lies of the Emerald Flame, passage chapter under 'The Time of Hunger: Gaelithox'.

You leave Gaelithox to a mournful goodbye on Dragonstone, pressing your forehead against her hard, scaly head, promising to come back, of exchanging her diet for fat, juicy whales, for more wind-whipped rides, before riding back on Sunfyre with Aegon. The younger dragon would not rise from the beaches in fear of the cannibalistic elder, but you made ensuring promises to teach Gaelithox not to chew your dearest brother's dragon.

You had gone most of your life without the feeling of a bond beneath you, warm and alive and wild, and the roar and stench that though new, felt so familiar in your ribcage— you will fly again. And with your brothers beside you. With Helaena and her lovely Dreamfyre.

To think they had taken this from you too, to placate them. To play into their hands like a mewling kitten.

No more.

It is paces before fast is about to break when you both touch back down to Kings Landing. The Keep busying with its occupants, servants and maids bolstering with quickened feet to ensure the lords and royals are awakened with full, poached meals, dresses and coats readied for their lords and ladies, a new, glorious day under the Reign of the Black Queen.

"What now?" Aegon asks, trying to keep with your pace but he is fatigued, failing to stop his yawns. The excitement of last night had come upon him like a fog, and he is missing his bed. Hells, he is missing the bed he stays with his wife if it meant he would get a full night's sleep in the hours of the day.

"Now, we speak nothing of what happened."

He turns to you, frowning. "Just like that?"

"Just like that." You beam, nodding in favour of soldiers and maids who bow in reverence to the Crown Princess. You know you smell of dragon and night, and you need a bath. And to talk to Dyanna before you seek your daughters. "I will need time and people. The board must still be set for me to perfectly execute what I have in store."

"Alright." He yawns again. "I'll be in my quarters, passed out, if you need me. Please do not need me until sup."

You laugh breathlessly, grabbing his hand and giving it a wet kiss. "I will give you your rest, be assured. Kirimvose, dōna lēkia, Thank you, sweet brother."

The words are simple, said in a quiet murmur heavy with love and meaning. Aegon presses a loving kiss to your head, unable to stop himself winding an arm around you.

"Syt ao, va moriot, ñuha prūmia. For you, always, my heart."

As you break to each other's chambers— his, to sleep, you, already meeting Yna and requesting for a bath — you don't notice the lurker that watched the intimate moment between twins, humming in amusement before it moves to follow you.

Back in your quarters— your marriage quarters as Jacaerys had requested that you forgo having your own, not wishing to part with you — the maids are already busying themselves airing the room, moving to follow your usual routine. The only thing breaking it is the tub now in the centre.

"Thank you," you say to Yna as she picks out the pins from your hair, shrugging off your dress in the process as soon as the maids had untangled the lace behind you.

"Call for Dyanna," you tell them as they bow and leave, the door clicking softly behind them. Plans must be made. Bath for now.

With the world stifled for a second, left with only you and your thoughts, you plunge your body under too-hot water, sighing  against the aches and pains in your body. Dragon-riding is a new endeavour to your muscles, and though enjoyable, was still too new.

You sigh as tears fall from your eyes, blinking exhaustedly against soft, humming daylight. You had always known that love, as it is, is a maiden's folly. A foolish, hapless play meant to fool young girls into thinking the world is kind; a pretty place.

It was an even farther thought from you, a princess of the realm. At a young age, it has been drilled to you that your womb is a rare commodity. Your body has never been your own, a piece meant to be moved in a bigger game that you are used for, not play.

You weren't stupid.

If there's a few things Otto Hightower had ever granted you, apart from gifting you his keen prowess in moving power beneath your fingertips, in hungering for more, for better— it is understanding what each person is, who they can be, how you can move them. A flatter, a flair, a push. As a man, there is much to be desired about your grandsire; he used people, used family to pursue power, but you can't truly fault him for that as you were the same.

You just took better care of the people under your wing.

And for Jace, you had banished him.

The worst part, you knew there was a good, fat chance you would care for the princeling. He was a kind man, a sweet man, and with a guiding hand, you could forge yourself the best husband for yourself as much as you can mould a great king and a wonderful father. Women's hands are ever carved to mould and prod men. We stand behind, a presence or a hand, an echo of power.

But your Jace had surpassed it all, and in the moons leading up to your present day, to giving him his heirs, two beautiful daughters, the promised full Valyrian colouring in the silver hair in Daenera, your eldest, the wide, violet gaze in Aemma— the name of his mother's mother, a request of him that you had kindly, graciously fucking agreed to — of course there is a part of you, the girlish, tender heart that you long thought you had buried to get here, would fall for the brown-eyed, wondrous man.

You sink deeper into the tub, sighing as you let yourself unravel—

When you feel it. A presence in your room. It's soft. Silent. Not a lot would feel as such, but as paranoid as you are, as you keep your spiders clean and pretty with your dewy-eyed webs— you know better.

Your mind runs with ideas on who it might be, and come to a few people. No true name rises. The Red Keep is flooded with spies and traitors. You test your luck, sitting up on the tub, raising an arm over the lip of it and flicking water with your fingertips.

"If you are here to kill me, I'm afraid it will be a lost cause."

He laughs, sardonic and edged and familiar, jetting a tingle down your spine.

Well. There's getting a calm bath.

"Perceptive as always, niece," he says, heavy footfalls approaching now that he has been caught. "I'm just here to say hello."

You raise your eyes, mouth curled but unsmiling at the man who acts as the biggest thorn to your plots. Daemon Targaryen has never fallen through your webs, on guard against your flatter, your push, or your flair. Of course, taking the position of his daughter might have forever burnt that road, but you would think he'd ease up just a little bit when his wife, the Queen, had warmed to you considerably.

Unlike your mother, you had never been hostile to your bitch of an elder sister. Just like your plots for Aegon and Jacaerys, and nodding along to thread your father had started but abandoned, foolishly thinking the realm would follow without him fully ensuring your sister's claim to the throne— you carefully maintained a polite farce with Rhaenyra.

Ultimately, this became a boon to you, as she had responded positively to your abrupt marriage to her son, even reminding her deranged guard dog of their own marriage. The cream to your lemon cake had been when you birthed Aemma, the Queen's most favourite grandchild thus far. When she was a babe, Rhaenyra was never far; almost, always holding your daughter, cooing at her cheeks, remarking her likeness to her namesake with pure fondness.

But Daemon Targaryen knew, in the deepness of his marrow, that there is something wrong with you.

"Hello," you answer primly. He laughs, leaning against the passage to your open balcony. "We could have had this elating greeting at fast, if you wish to break it with me and my own."

He scoffs, unable to hide his disdain at the thought. It breaks his stare of your naked visage. Men. "I would rather jump to the fighting pits, good daughter."

"How rude. Is that all?" You meet his gaze steadily, tilting your head. "If it is not obvious yet, good father, I am bathing."

An amused smirk. "I can see that." Lecherous fucking geezer. "No matter. I just have a... curious thought, a wonder I suspect you may be able to answer. See. Truly odd it is, for the keepers to alert me this morning that Sunfyre had taken a ride past the Hour of Owl." Your heart thuds in your ribcage and you do your best to keep your expression mildly irritated. "Not with one, drunken rider, but with another. It had taken them hours, only coming back when morning had already presented in the air."

He steps forward, slow, menacing, until he reaches the edge of your tub and crouches. Your gazes are still unmatched in height, defiant as yours might be.

"The distinct smell wafts them, a Keeper said, and one suspects that though one dragon left last night, two might have come back this morning for he had seen another fly away." His fingers dips into the water, swirling the steam without breaking eye contact. "I wonder if you know anything about it, darling niece of mine."

The mocking emphasis is not lost on you. If the Queen is the Realm's Delight, you were Darling of the Realm. A sweet, merry girl, the secondborn daughter of Viserys I who frequently fought for the plight of the small folk, who gathered friends of all kinds of lords and ladies no matter the standing of their houses to her own, visiting far lands and charming every person in any room. Who made any feast brighter, always sparkling, always the darling.

Less of a dragon, more of a fairytale.

You sit up, leaning, baring your breasts completely to him as you pull yourself up on the ledge he is crouched from. He leans back, only slightly, as you smile demurely. Sweet. Tart. On the edge of pulling his head and hitting it against the copper tub.

"I am unsure of what you suspect, or is accusing me of, kepus, uncle," you purr and there's a twitch in his mouth, a widen in his irises— men are so fucking simple — "I had been feeling down last night, as my husband, as you know, is beyond my reach at the moment as he rallies alliances for the good of the realm. My brother had simply offered to take me out riding, trying to quell my loneliness with an excitable flight I had never been afforded."

You tilt your head. "Even if there had been a dragon binded to my own, why why would I not regale the realm with news of my success? I have longed for a dragon of my own, but alas, I have not quite succeeded where most of the family have." You pout. His eyes flicker. "Mayhaps I am more Hightower than I am Targaryen."

A huff leaves his lips, the amusement in his smile arching to his dark, dark gaze. Before you can react, his hand had comes forward to hold your chin in a tight grip, your jaw aching soon enough at the fingers that dig against your skin, wanting to bruise, to break.

Though a tremble passes your body, you keep his stare, gritting your teeth as the pad of his thumb brushes your lips. Moments and desires thrum between a charged hatred.

The lust is twisted from wanting to fuck you to wanting to kill you. The line is not simple. Maybe that is your fate together.

But he can't. You are well too ingrained in his family now, loved by the people he cared about. You are untouchable. For now. This is a warning, waiting for you to stutter, to show your hand. Any show of your true intentions... he is more than happy to swing Dark Sister across your throat.

He releases you without another word, standing up and leaving through the front door, the door clicking shut.

You sink back into the bath, letting the water engulf you.

Your daughters are moons apart in birth, and there are only a few differences between them that people oft remarked they could be twins. Daenera is taller, spindly. Built like Aemond when he was younger. Her hair is spun moon and eyes of mullish blue. It reminds you of Daeron's eyes. You had named Daenera yourself, a gruelling birth that took the entire night. You promised Jacaerys he could name the second. He had chosen Aemma for a girl, Laenor for a boy.

Not a few moons later, you were with child again. Your husband pinked at the cheeks at the chiding from his family. When she cried into the afternoon sun—Aemma was born mid day, during a council meeting — he pain did not stop the laugh that came out of your mouth from the horrified expression from the Master of Coin as your water broke.

Aemma had a sweetheart face, cheeks much fatter than her older sister's, with a yellowish tinge to her hair, curlier too, reminding you of Aegon. And Aemma laughed more, her deep, violet eyes always half closed as she exploded in giggles and bright, sunshine happiness.

Sons they might not be, but you had given heirs for the throne. And for them, you would do anything to keep their futures intact. Bond with a dragon, face the Rogue Prince, upheave Winterfell. Anything.

You flounce to the nursery where you know the two would be, smiling sweetly at every person you pass as they bow in reverence. Most wore sights of confusion, their greedy eyes and wagging tongues drinking in the deep, emerald glisten of your gown.

It's an old dress, one you keep in the corner of your collection. It isn't as if you had forgo the colours of your mother's house, but playing court meant every movement, even the clothes you wear, can be meaningful. And since your marriage, your Jace liked you in Velaryon colours.

"A goddess come to bless," he gasped against your collarbone, keeping your legs high on his waist as he rutted into you before his teeth sunk on your skin. As newlyweds go, there is not a lot of teasing to be had for your husband to curl against you in a darkened alcove. Merely wearing his favourite colour on your skin has him panting like a dog. His favourite dress is a seafoam blue that dragged longer against the ground in a soft, almost-gossamer material with a silver belt.

Enticing him never took long, but you enjoyed the dance presented. You enjoyed the dark hunger that filled him until he grabbed you to take you because he just had to take you.

The fresh wound slices deeper as you imagine all the things Jacaerys is doing to the so called Sara Snow. The emerald green of your gown shimmers with your anger.

"Fucking bastards," you can't help but say aloud, nodding at the guards posted on the nursery as you hear the squeals of your daughter and the calm, even voice of your brother.

"Muña! Mother!" Aemma squeals, untangling herself from being pressed against Aegon's side as the children— Daenera and Jaehaera — cuddle around him, before running to you. Helaena is on the floor, entertaining baby Maelor. Your mother, hands twisting against her own, stands vigil by the window, staring far ahead.

You catch your secondborn, giggling as you pressed kiss after kiss on her face.

"I see everyone has started without me. Where is Jaehaerys?"

"You were late, sodjisto, aunt," Jaehaera grins gummily. Jahaera is only a year older than Daenera. Your daughters, five and a half and five respectively. "Jaehaerys is with kepus, uncle. They are training."

"Smart girl." You meet your brother's gaze, whose eyes had notably been staring at your dress, mouth turned down. "Why don't you three play with Helaena? I shall speak about Name Day gifts for your Uncle Joffrey for a bit, hm?"

As Aemma shrieks something about cakes, and Daenera dutifully kissing your cheek in greeting before she takes Jaehaera's hand, you turn to your brother and mother.

"Aemond?" you ask softly, keeping your voice out of earshot. Alicent shakes her head. You nod. "Good. We don't want him inciting a war before I have mine properly planned."

As the Dowager draws in a sharp inhale, Aegon grabs your hands, the worry pulled taunt in his eyebrows. "Are you seriously contemplating war, sister? Isn't there a better way to punish them?"

"What punishment does a man regale in?" you hiss, stepping close to him. "Or the Queen's heir for the bloody matter? When Aemond nearly killed Lucerys, and he confronted me as if I had ordered Vhagar to tear through his brother, I thought I had put to bed any doubts in our marriage. It seems that men stray, regardless. My daughters may be his heir now, but what is to say that bastard wildling he's found himself cock deep in produces a son? Will he shame me with a mistress? Or will he shame me with a second wife?"

Your mother's lips tightens, her fingers paling at how tight she is gripping her nerves.

"Bastard or not, if he takes her to wife, I will be nothing. Make that babe a son, and the realm will rally for it. Daenera is his heir. My daughters will not be forgone. I will not be pushed aside. This is mercy, brother," you say softly, tucking a stray curl behind his ear. "My last one. It requires time, moons, to unfurl. It requires seeding doubt and unfathomable inadequacy. Better if Aemond is none the wiser, Helaena the same. But I will need both of you for this to work. It is the only time I will ever ask. For me. For my daughters."

"And you will punish Winterfell with a war?" your mother asks, frown pulled deep. "That is the plan?"

"I will not. I won't do such a thing so blatant, mother, you know me better than that. But this is my last mercy, and it will be the last. For the next time he offends me so, I do not care if Rhaenyra feeds me to Syrax. I will put a dagger through his heart, heir or not."

The Prince Jacaerys comes back not a week later. Though he comes back to the same castle with the same occupants— your shiny new threads gleam. The stage has been set, a play ready to act. You had sent more spiders in the North, keeping a close eye to every blasphemy your husband has been enjoying in the absence of his duties, and as the rage in you quietly grew with each new whisper, your determination hardens.

You mark each indescretion. You keep a tally.

You count for each fall your blow will land on him.

Vermax lands with a screech and a heavy thump, your husband leaping off him with a grin on his face, matching the one you own, waving your arm joyously with Aemma in your arm and Daenera beside you, holding to your skirt as she grinned at her father.

Aemma wiggles under your hold, and you let Jace get close enough before you set her down, laughing, "Okay, okay!" Her laughter carries through as she scrambles like a bull to her father. A squeal peals out of her as Jace picks her up just in time and tosses her in the air.

"Want to meet kepa, father, sweet girl?" you whisper to Daenera, running a hand down her hair before she nods, breaking out into her own sprint, hugging her father as he greets them with laughter and kisses.

You let them have their time, and this, at least, eases your heart truthfully. A kind reminder that Jace adores his daughters.

You stay at the edge of the entrance, your too-wide grin softens into a smile. You were dramatic, nothing new about that, but even in the pale, pearl blue of your dress in silky, Myrish lace, the emeralds in your heavy, golden belt winks. Green ribbons twisted in your hair alongside fresh flowers. When the trio of your family treks toward you, silver-haired babes clinging to your dark haired prince, you serve a wink at the girls and they untangle themselves from their father while you stepped forward.

A choreographed dance, not giving him time to think. To pause.

Every step is calculated, every item on your body— the silk, the small seahorse that locks your dress behind you, the tint on your lips to the oil in your hair and body — is made to perform. You engulf him in you as if you want to suffocate his senses, your arms wrapping around him with sweet kisses pressing on his face, his neck.

Most in the dragonpit looked away, others, scandalously amazed and enchanted, watch as the princess is undeniably enthralled with her lord husband.

His laughter rumbles across his body, infecting your own, smelling of dragonback and crisp winds. You wonder if your nose is more heightened, you would be able to smell his whore in him, but you don't. It's just him. Your Jace.

Your body moulds against his as his arms tightens around you. When you lean back, you sweetly press a chaste kiss on his lips, grinning.

"What is this?" he huffs a laugh, meeting your doeful gaze. Your fingers curl around his chin, his cheek, idly tapping and touching as if you are committing so much newness to memory.

"Kostagon iā ābrazȳrys daor jaelagon zirȳla valzȳrys? Can a wife not want her husband?" you ask softly, pressing a few more kisses before sucking the last one just under his ear. His body shudders. You hide your smirk. "Skori ēza issare qrīdrughagon tolī bōsa? When he has been away too long?"

A yearning look tints your gaze from under your lashes, and you have to stifle the winning smirk as guilt pinches his face.

"My apologies, my wife. I did not mean to be away from you for long. From the girls." As his eyes flick to his daughters, your mask momentarily sharpens into clear distaste. The urge to dig your fingers into his eyes until he is bleeding and screaming under you is one you tamper with great distress.

Did not mean...

Did not mean to have a dalliance with another woman?

Did not mean to fall into bed with a fucking bastard, you insidious cunt, while I await here with your heirs?

Your anger thrums, nestled deep in your heart, it breathes. You school your face the moment he turns back to you, bringing your hands to his lips, kissing each finger with reverent tenderness. His brown eyes smoulder, rubbing your bare— irises widening — back.

"If you wish it, I can be on my knees for my apologies, my princess."

Your mouth curls. "I'm afraid that might have to be quite later, my prince."

"Huh?"

"The Dowager Queen hoped to congratulate you on your successful campaigning. Reaching as far as the North so frequently, we planned a feast for your return." Eyes shinning, you cup his face. You hope the guilt eats him raw from the inside out. Like worms. Like termites. Hungry, hungry, hungry. "We have never been more proud of you, I have never been more proud of you."

You laugh brightly, ignoring the way he squeezed you just a bit harder that mere second the same time his eyes tightened. "The moment I told the girls of it, they had begged to dance with you." Then you bit your lip, frowning slightly. "I... I understand if you are tired, 'tis a long journey after all, I did try to tell them you might want to rest, we can sneak you—"

"No, no, my heart, of course I would be happy to, I— I want nothing more." He brings you close, face disappearing into your neck. "Thank you. I love you."

You hum, carding your fingers through his hair. "As I love you."

For the rest of the feast, you dance just at the edges of his fingertips, ensuring that you permeated his sights and senses despite it. A game. A dance. When he thanks revelries who congratulate him, who ask him of his adventures, you proudly stand beside him, dutiful as the wife that you are, spearing him with compliments as much as you can. Hands squeezing his arm, your oils swallowing him with your smell.

When dinner came, you take chances massaging his thigh, sliding a salacious grin that had him blushing, ever so sweet, green— making you wonder what kind of fucking bastards do that he finds your attention so swallowing.

You don't let up.

Whenever he, in turn made a move, you sidestep, flutter a smirk, a wink; always escaping, letting him grow frustrated as the night went on.

Your one respite from taunting him had been when he danced with his daughters, making a gallant show of asking them, even Jaehaera. Giggles and spins, the ladies of the court fawn and coo.

Even now, you're making him to be the perfect man. The endearing husband, the wondrous father, the brilliant prince, the perfect lord.

To execute your plan, it must be made with a surgical precision. A slice that guts him to his knees, that breaks his spirit and quenches the whispering, wicked madness nestling with your ire. On another cheek, he must remain upright and upstanding, as to keep your daughters' future in perfect order.

You catch the domineering gaze of Daemon Targaryen, idle as he is, on the side of his distracted Queen, talking to a highborn lady. You don't look away as you toast him your cup of Arbour Red before you pucker your lips for a taste. Your eyes move to where your husband is already looking, flushed red and sweaty from all the dancing, your girls, preening and giggling around him.

You tilt your chin at him, a challenge in your gaze, before you slowly pull your lips away from your wine, stained red.

His throat bobs.

It will be a long, arduous game. Full of pitfalls and tightened webbing. One trip can kill you. But once the machinations are in order, once everything and everyone is in their proper places... oh, you cannot wait for the dance the dragons will make.

A flutter, a simpered footstep. Then a rustle of a dress as one bows.

"My lady," Dyanna greets behind you.

"Hm?"

"The spiders in the ice have met the pup in the snow."

"And?"

"The pup is not suspicious, in fact, they might go as far as to say that the pup is lonely. Though others largely understand her existence... no one likes a bastard."

You snort. "No, they don't, do they?"

"The wolf cares for the pup though, and is largely protective of his only sister."

"Hm. Complicated, but not impossible. Have Meera change the tone of my missive. A softer edge. Sweet but not overtly. Ensure the prerogative of politeness. Then have it sent to the Rookery. The proper channels."

You sigh, taking the edge of your braid and twisting through the ribbons your maid tangled between them. Tonight, you had elected Targaryen colours. A black dress akin to scales and a low, exposed back and dipping front, held together in red ribbons and silver chains. One that might be too on the nose, but the constant, feverish stares from your husband made it worth it.

"We have to ensure a good relationship with the Warden of the North, don't you think so?" You have not looked away from your husband since your maid came, and as he whispered something in Daenera's ear, nodding off to her grandmother with Aemma towed, he turned towards you, one stride after another.

"Precisely what I thought, milady."

"Go," you order her for the last time, giving her your cup, just before Jacaerys reaches you.

Game, set.

Worshipping you has always been something Jace excelled at. At the least, his cock was much larger than most, and without the preparation of his tongue and mouth, it burned. At most, he oft found himself holding your shaking thighs, your head and shoulders left on the bed as he feasted on you like a man starved, hungered for your nectar, the sounds you make, and the shaking of your body as you reached your peak on his tongue.

"J-Jace, please, I—" Your breath stutters, a hiccup escaping your mouth, but he is not letting up. On his knees as only a lordling can with his back straight, he is holding your thighs, your lower back, eating your cunny for the third time of the night.

As soon as he had reached you, he grasped your waist, whispering against your hair in a rumbled groan, "You are torturing me so, my wife. We leave. Now."

"Now?" you echoed, amused. "This is a feast in your honour."

"My honour is already hanging by a thread. The revelry will go on without us. I want to have my fill of you."

And fill he had. He didn't even wait to get you out of your dress before he had pushed your skirt upward, gone on his knees, and got his tongue inside of you.

Now, you are overwhelmed, overstimulated as you are hazy, gripping the wrecked sheets as your peak reached you once more. A strangled, breathy cry of his name falls between your lips as your back arched impossibly so, and instead of letting up, this seemed to fuel him harder, the muscle of his mouth working harder inside of your cunt, hands digging into your flesh to keep you steady.

It builds with a stimulation unending, and just as you're on the throes of your last high, it builds again, quick and fast this time, shuddering gasps of, "o-oh gods, g-gods, Jace!" is the last thing you are able to shout before your fourth peak breaks against the shudders of your last one, your wetness exploding, and you start crying before he lets up.

Your blubber becomes laughter, and he is soft as he lies you down, massaging your thighs as you twitched. He hovers above you, running gentle hands across your arms, kneading through skin, before he reaches your face. He's still in most of his clothes, his long white shirt and breeches, but his mouth is covered in your wetness before he wipes it, obscene in the prettiness of his face and messy locks from where you had tugged and grabbed.

He presses a gentle kiss to your cheek, so close to your body, all too tangled in your soul, and can feel his hard cock upright and wanting against your belly, but he pays it no mind. Concern mars his features as he brushes down your hair.

"Are you alright, my love? Too much?"

You shake your head, brushing your hand down his chest. "N-no, I am well. I just never did that before."

He smiles, kissing your closed eyelids before he brings you close to his chest, cuddling you deep. "You deserve all the pleasure I can give you," he says against your hair. "I have been gone far too long. Consider it my apology."

You hum, eyes open. "Apology for what? You were doing your duty, nothing more, ñuha zaldrīzes, my dragon." You feel him stiffen as you keep your voice soft, caring. "I understand duty far better than you. It is what I love most about you."

You look up, taking his chin between your fingertips as you stared at those warm, brown eyes. "You, who carries your honour like a shield and your duty like a sword. I feel as if the gods had blessed me a husband far better than I should have had for I know I do not deserve you."

"H-how can you say that? You are—" He swallows. "— You are the most excellent woman. The mother of my children. You... You are the one I do not deserve."

Your head falls back against his chest, gripping his shirt. Only by your teeth had you stop yourself from screaming.

You curdle, you keep, you poise.

"My love?"

But you pay him no mind, pushing him on his back as you straddle him, your hands working quick to unlace his breeches until his cock slaps against his stomach, end red and swollen. A sharp hiss falls from his lips as your hand tugs on it once. Twice.

He calls your name, spits it really, eyes blown with lust as he holds your waist, unsure if he should lift you off him or grind you against his aching cock.

"I want you inside me," you whimper, plead, feeling his cock twitch at your words, your false, yearning gaze. He mistakes the burned tears of anger in your eyes as unbridled want. "I have gone so long without your warmth, your cock, swelling inside me, your seed nestling deep, taking root—"

"Yes," he gasps, fingers digging into your doughy sides, pulling you up, moving you around whilst you grabbed his length and directed inside your wet, hot cunt inch by inch, filling you so thickly you can feel him in your throat. It takes time, patience and grit, but you're wet enough and you're determined. Once he's fully inside of you through a choked moan of your own, his neck arches, head thrown back. "Fuck! Yes, y-yes, there you are, my g-good fucking girl."

You move slow at first, taking him, bracing one hand on his knee, almost testing the feel him of back in the familiar contours of your cunt. Veins pop between each groan and choke that shudders through him whilst praise, your name, the possessive titles— my love, my wife, my princess — is spit in between.

When the heat tightens in your belly, you shift positions, placing both palms on his chest, and riding him without abandon, bouncing up and down as you watch with a sharp eye as his release builds. His hips move on their own, fucking up in you as you meet his thrusts with equal vigour, and it's delicious. It's heated. You grind your swollen folds against his mon and your cries make him thrust up harder into you, calling your name, denting your doughy hips.

You don't stop, your pleasure at the back of your mind, wanting him to unravel, to break— a final cry of your name dissolving into a choked moan, spilling his seed deep inside, the continuous snap of his hips digging it deeper into your womb.

But your last peak is still tightening, so you press a quick kiss on his chest, a bite really, before you continue to chase your own high, a hiss slipping his lips but moving your hips with his iron-grip, stutters of, "d-do it, reach your high, f-fuck! fuck!"— Your head throws back, nails digging his skin as your cunt clenches his cock in a vice grip, forcing his hips to snap up once more, twice, until you fall, slumping against him.

When he kisses the top of your head, murmuring words you ignore, you close your eyes.

Your plan is in motion. The missive will be sent to the Lord Stark, in pursuit of an innocent friendship. The spiders you have placed on the Northern bastard are set, and a dragon flies in Dragonstone with your bond in its blood.

Your Jace is home. He will fall in love with you all over again. His wonderful daughters and darling princess, he will regret the events that have transpired in the cold. In his head, he will make promises to do better, to be better, that whatever happened is a blip. A mistake that will not happen again. but you know, he will trip. He will wander once more.

But you will make sure that the next time he does so, he will regret it for the rest of his days.

Because it is not you who will burn Winterfell to the ground.

It will be him.

Your plan moves, your web is perfect.

Now, the spider waits for the idiot fucking flies to feed on.

TAGGED: @inkareds @marihoneywk @caterina-caterina @ahristata @xxvelvetxxxx @but-i-write-so-i-must-count @bunbunbl0gs @yazzzmints @bellstwd @hiraethrhapsody

[devotedfem]

«Scream»

Synopsis: It's late and you're watching horror movies. But someone's calling you, a weirdo asking you questions about classic horror films. Nothing was wrong until he started to threat you, and when you hang up the phone you realized there's murderers wearing ghostface masks in your house.

Maknae line (poly) x f. Reader

2.7K words.

Genre: Scream au | yander-ish.

Tags: psycopaths maknae line, mind games, psychological terror, murderers (implied but not described), betrayal, the maknae line are a menace here, emotional conflict, delusional maknae line, angry reader, very VERY dubious consent (coercion is not consent so read with caution), happy ending for them not for reader, smut, overstimulation.

A/N: I'm so sorry for disappearing for literally a month, i moved to another country and life has been very stressful lately, so yeah i took a break from writing but here i am again, writing lots of vminkook p0rn. Hope you enjoy!

From the series masterlist; Final girl.

Navigation Masterlist.

You’re eating popcorn, resting on your couch with your feet up on the armchair. You took a gulp of your coke can without breaking your gaze from the tv screen, you startled staining your shirt when the slasher appeared from nowhere, you cursed under your breath taking off your shirt but before you can go to your room to change, your phone vibrated with notifications. You turned them off because the boys always get annoying on the weekends.

You opened the group chat, rolling your eyes when you see the 123 unread messages.

Group chat: Y/n and the homos.

Jiminie: Guys can u please stfu for a moment, I wanna sleep but u don’t stop talking shit.

You: let’s kicked them out of the group Jiminie, I swear I can’t even watch a movie in peace.

Jjk: u two r so fcking boring.

Tae: right? Like can u two at least read what were talking abt.

You: we’re*

Jiminie: lol

Jjk: Guys this is serious, there’s a sicko killing people wearing a ghostface mask.

You: Ghostface masks are hot.

Tae: ??

Jjk: ???????

Jiminie: ik right

You: Anyway, maybe is just a rookie killer without imagination, like it’s Halloween and there’s a lot of sickos around here. Just closed ur doors and don’t be a pussy.

Tae: I��m literally speechless.

Jiminie: Bye I’m sleeping, stfu.

Jjk: we warned u.

You dropped your phone on the couch, walking to your kitchen to make more popcorn. You missed the plot twist of the movie because of your friend’s annoying group chat.

You were on your bra and pajama pants, not caring about anything in the world. Until your home phone rings in your kitchen making you stop immediately. You frowned tilting your head to the side, watching the old home phone still ringing. It’s being ages since someone called to that number, you didn’t even know that the ancient thing was still working.

“Odd,” you murmured to yourself, answering the phone.

“Hello?”

You heard a heavy breath on the other side of the phone. The person says nothing back, making you frown.

“Who’s this? And why are you calling to this number?” Your patience was running thin ice.

“I’m watching you,” said a man with a low voice.

You rolled your eyes with annoyance.

“Is this a prank? Don’t call to this number again or I’ll fuck you up.”

You were about to hang up the phone but a deep chuckle from the man stopped you. Why does he sound familiar to you?

“Are you watching Friday the 13th?” He taunted. His voice sounded odd, like if he was lowering it purposely.

Your stomach sink with dread, your heart rate speed up when you heard from the tv the slasher killing people.

“What if I do?” You gritted between teeth, keeping an eye on your surroundings. You won’t show fear to that weirdo.

 “Let’s play a game, I’ll ask you some questions about horror movies. And if you answer wrong, I’ll kill you.”

Your eyes widened by his words, you were about to hang up and call the police but the other man was quicker than you.

“If you hang up or try to touch your fucking phone I’ll slice your neck,” the threat made you freeze on your place, the wire of the home phone wouldn't let you move far away anyway.

You felt your eyes sting up with tears by fear. You remember Jungkook and Taehyung warning.

Your breath turned shallow and your grip on the home phone started to tremble. You felt cornered and scared.

“What’s the identity of the masked killer of Scream?”

You inhaled deep, this one was easy.

“Uhm, his name was Billy, Sidney’s boyfriend.”

Your eyes roamed your kitchen, watching your surroundings again with dread and fear.

“Good.”

You couldn’t help but frown again because he sounded so familiar to you, but you can’t pinpoint of whom that voice belongs to.

“Last one; what’s the plot twist of Friday the 13th?”

Fucking fucker.

This time your eyes blurred by unshed tears because of how nervous and panicked you felt. You’ve never been good at dealing with strong emotions, even when you try to act tough, in your insides you’re very easy to scare and intimidate.

“I- please i-I don’t know,” you stuttered with quivering lips, you feel like having a panic attack.

“Look behind you, sweetheart.”

Your breath hitched sharply, you turned your neck to look behind you, widening your eyes and screaming at the top of your lungs when you saw a man in your kitchen, wearing a ghostface mask and waving his unoccupied hand at you.

And then you run.

And he did it too.

You grabbed your phone from the couch, noticing with horror how the SIM card was missing. But you didn’t have time to linger about that thought.

You listened to his steps chasing you from behind, making you run faster by the increase of adrenaline pumping your veins.

You tried to open the front door of your house, but it didn’t budge. You were home alone, your parents went out in a trip.

You were fucked up.

Without any more options, you climbed the staircases hiding in a bathroom.

You try texting your parents but it was past midnight and your phone didn’t have its sim card, so you can’t call neither text.

That’s why you opened the app where you and your friends have the group chat.

Group chat: Y/n and the homos.

You: CALL THE POLICE THERE’S SOMEONE IN MY HOUSE AND THEYTOOKMYSIM CARD

Jjk: y/n? what the fuck, that’s not funny.

You: PLEASE IM NOT JOKING AND I CANTK CALLM THEPLICE

Tae: are you being serious right know?

Jiminnie: you guys again?

Jjk: Y/n’s saying there’s someone in her house but she can’t call the police but she can chat with us lol.

You: GUYS PLEASEIMSERIUS PLEASE HES COMING I NEED YOUR HELP CALL THE POLICE!!!!!!!!!!!

Tae: dude writing in capitals won’t make your prank more credible

You screamed into your hand with frustration, pulling your hairs out and weeping with fear, you wanted to smash your head against the tiles by exasperation. They weren’t taking you seriously.

Then you half open the door quietly, watching the murderer roaming the hallway. When he turned his back to you, distracted on his phone, you took yours to snap a picture of him.

Group chat: Y/n and the homos.

You: *send picture*

You: THIS IS HIM HES INMYHOUSE

Jjk: what the fuck

You: JUNGKOOK IM HAVINGAPANICK ATTACK CALL THE FUCKING POLICE OR ILL KILL YOU MYSELF

Tae: Damn no need to be so harsh y/n, calm down.

You: CALL THE POLICE YOU MORONS

Jiminnie: u guys r so annoying

You: jiminniehelp me please please please im scared imnot lying

Jjk: y/n you’re making me worry, aren’t you fucking with us?

You: NOO!!!!!!!!

Tae: oh well, then we should do something abt it

You: OFC U IDIOT

Jjk: yeah ur right tae, what we should do?

You: CALLTHEPOLICE?????!!!!!!!!

Tae: u think so?

Jjk: mm not so sure

Tae: and u Jiminnie, what do u think?

You: guys whats happening, please im scared

Jiminnie: I think I’ll go and help my y/n.

You frowned with trembling hands, tasting the saltiness of your silent tears. You were about to throw up and insult them again but the bathroom’s door opening made you jump with fear.

“Here you are.”

In any other circumstance you would scream and run for your life, you would grab something from the bathroom to throw it at him and save your life. But none of that happened, you stayed in your spot freeze, maybe because you were having a panic attack, but even then your primal instincts should fuel you to run. But that wasn’t the reason of your frozen state. Not at all. It was the fact that you recognized that voice.

“You… are you…”

Then the murderer took off his ghostface mask, tilting his head to the side and making your heart shatter.

“Yes my y/n?”

Jimin, fucking Park Jimin.

The deep fear was replaced by ugly hurt and anger. You saw red, walking towards him with your fists clenched, you punched him on his shoulder but he didn’t budge.

“How dare you scared me like that! You think is funny?! I hate you so much, I don’t want to see your fucking face ever again. GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!” you screamed at the top of your lungs, with angry tears streaming to your chin.

“You thought I was joking?” he asked with mirth, the dark glint in his eyes turned your stomach with dread.

“Just get out Jimin,” you said tired and hurt.

“Y/n, I’m here to kill you-”

And just by that your fear came back twice as hard, your ears buzzed clogging up Jimin’s next words.

You ignored your throat lump of hurt and betrayal, you felt numb while running away from him, hiding in one of the bottom’s cabinets of your kitchen.

You wrapped your arms around your legs, pulling your knees to your chest. You cried until you felt your eyes swelling.

“Y/n? Baby where are you?”

Your eyes widened at Taehyung’s sweet voice calling for you.

You didn’t think twice before opening the cabinet and throwing yourself at him, wrapping your arms around his neck.

Taehyung chuckled hugging you back as hard, stroking your hair while you’re crying on his neck.

“There there, nothing bad will happen to you.”

The shinning knife in Taehyung’s other hand knocked some sense into you. The realization of your reality hit you hard making you gasp and break the hug in a flash, you watched him with your jaw set and your eyes showing the deep hurt and betrayal you felt inside.

Taehyung foxy smile widened on his lips, he pouted when you took a step back from him.

“I won’t hurt you, I promise,” he said softly, biting his bottom lip to stop a smirk.

You let him come closer to you just a step, and then you blow his head with a pan making him whimper with pain. You used his moment of confusion to run away past him.

You opened a window to get out of your house, your ears were buzzing by the raw adrenaline pumping your veins like liquid fire.

You were so, so close to reach your car until you’re not. The next thing you know is that you’re falling face down on the floor by a body launching at your back. You groaned with pain, feeling the body pinning you to the ground by its weight.

“Caught you,” Jungkook’s voice taunted against your ear, sounding out of breath.

You screamed at the top of your lungs, making Jungkook cursed under his breath. He covered your mouth quickly, lifting your body to take you inside the house again.

Your eyes were too swollen by the amount of tears you shed tonight, you were tired and hurt by their sick game.

Jungkook sat on your couch with you on his lap, one arm wrapped around your naked waist to pull you against his chest.

“Isn’t she so cute?” asked Jimin sighing dreamily, you felt acid rage running your veins. You felt like being mocked on.

“A little feisty, but pretty.” Taehyung sat beside you on the couch, his forehead dripping a little bit of blood. You smiled wide at his wound.

“Did it hurt?” You pointed to his forehead, he simply nodded with the corner of his lips curling down.

“Good,” you grinned with hatred.

“Now now, no need to be mean to our Taetae.” Jimin squatted before you, stroking your cheek even when you flinched your face away with disgust.

“No need to be fucking weirdos either, if you want to kill me do it already.” And then you literally spat on Jimin’s face, but to your horror and disgust he grinned wide tasting your drool with his tongue.

You wanted to throw up at the nasty sight.

“Sweetheart, we don’t want to hurt you, even less kill you,” chuckled lowly Jungkook behind you, his grip on your waist tightened a little.

“What? But Jimin said-“

“I didn't say anything, silly. You didn't even let me finish before running away,” Jimin sighed standing up, getting out of the living room and leaving you there feeling totally lost.

“Then… why are you guys doing this?” You whispered weakly, feeling way more unease than before.

“You’ll see.” Whispered back Taehyung near your ear, chuckling when you flinched.

And you did see it.

Jimin dragged your parent’s tied bodies to the floor of the living room, making your stomach sink with horror and dread.

“We came here to kill them.” Grinned proudly Jimin, kicking your dad’s side when he tried to wiggle out of his ties.

“Why!? Leave them alone they did nothing wrong!” You shouted at the top of your lungs, so loud that your throat hurt.

Jimin’s face morphed into an enraged scowl. He walked towards you in two large steps, gripping your chin up roughly. His jaw was set and his gaze hard.

“Shut up, before I cut your tongue.” He hissed with fury swimming in his brown eyes.

You whimpered afraid, recoiling into Jungkook’s chest unconsciously. Jimin’s always been scary when he’s pissed off, but never to this point.

Jimin’s face softened immediately at your fearful expression, you saw a hint of regret in his gaze.

“Hey, don’t scare her.” Jungkook snapped soothing you when you cried, he hugged you tightly. But his soft kiss on your temple didn’t comfort you at all, it only made you wailed harder with disgust.

“Puh-please just… leave us alone, what do you want?” You asked with labored breaths, you looked up hopeless at Jimin.

“Hyung,” warned Taehyung darkly. He sounded on edge by your cries.

“We want you.” Said Jimin with a cold voice.

“And we’re pissed at your parents for lying to you about us.” Continued Jungkook with a thick angered voice.

“So, we came here to teach them a lesson.” Grinned widely Taehyung like a sadist.

It was nothing new that your parents didn’t like your friends, they always told you to get away from them. You never listened to your parents because you thought they were saying bullshit, but you damn regretted not listening to them. They were right about these sickos.

“So you just want me.” You deadpan.

“Yep.” You listened behind you.

“Okay fine, do whatever you want with me. But. Let. Them. Go.” You gritted between teeth, pointing at your parents passed out on the floor.

The living room went silent at your words, the hush made you feel unease.

Jimin squatted in front of you again, this time, giving you the meanest and sadistic grin you’ve ever seen before.

“Take her up.” He ordered lowly, piercing his heavy and intimidating gaze on you, then his eyes dropped slowly to stare at your naked torso, gaze darkening and fixated on your chest. You felt your cheeks heating up by embarrassment, you felt self-conscious.

Your throat lump and your stomach turned when Jungkook carried you up to your room. Taehyung coo when he saw your silent tears streaming from your eyes.

Jungkook laid you down on the mattress rather softly, making your heart shatter. They were your best friends. The acid betrayal you felt burning your chest and throat was too painful to bear.

You weren’t surprised when you saw your SIM card on your nightstand.

“Stop looking so miserable, we’re not hurting you.” Jungkook said on the defensive. His scowl only angered you, but another part of you enjoyed to see that your disgust affected him.

“You fucking hurt my parents, chase me in my own house and manipulated me to let you fuck me! I have all the right in the world to feel and look miserable!” You felt your vocal cords ripping by your loud scream.

Jungkook and you stared at each other with labored breaths, you didn’t break your gaze in challenge, until you heard Jimin’s giggles.

“Tied her to the bed,” he said with a smile, making your stomach turn.

You closed your eyes, if they wanted to have their way with you, so it be. But you’ll be just a dull body under them, you choose to dissociate rather than to be present for them.

“None of that, open your eyes.” Taehyung growled gripping harshly your chin.

Your breath hitched when you felt a hand wrapping your neck, making your eyes open in a flash.

And the image above you freeze your entire body.

The three of them were staring down at you with hunger on their eyes, you saw their pretty faces coming closer to yours, smiling like the devils they were.

Ready to wreck you.

You can read the +18 continuation on Patreon.

taglist:

@demonshauntingthedoves @pynkgothicka @cutequeen00 @nothingsreal420 @ririkookiemonster-archives @cannotalwaysbenight @loumin908 @devilzliaison @uniquecutie-puffs @polarnightmyg

[beevean]

Four more episodes. I wasted an hour and a half of my life.

The Trepha plot literally leaks out of my ears. Nothing sticks to me, no character trait, no plot point. St. Germain is the only intriguing part, with how he charms his way into the prior for his investigation, but I can't be intrigued, knowing what happens to him in the next season. Honestly a shame. Considering this season alone, I'd even say that this is the character that most incarnates the spririt of his game counterpart.

There is, however, one part that bugs me. The Visitor is revealed to be a Night Creature forged by Isaac.

... literally when?

Isaac is not a random throwaway character. He's one of the main protagonists! We are following his journey! How come we never saw him forging a huge Night Creature with the power of brainwashing people???? You'd think it'd come up in his plot!

These details, along with Morana being presented as much more important than she is, are what make me suspect that the writing got mangled in the process.

The Alucard plot is even worse. At least utterly irrelevant stuff happens in the Trepha plot: there is literally nothing here. I do not give a single shit about Cho and her slaves, their tale of horror doesn't match the pretty, prolonged dance of death we have to see. I only question how the Japanese not-twins managed to travel from Hokkaido to Wallachia in one month, if in roughly that same period of time Carmilla and her army only travelled from Wallachia to Styria. Guys. Guys you have no idea how wide Asia is. And I'm generously ignoring how Sumi and Taka shouldn't even know what an Europe is.

Sumi and Taka are also jarring in retrospect. They are full of vigor, energetic and almost naive, in a similar manner as Sypha (despite allegedly being runaway slaves constantly exposed to terror and "betrayal"). When they talk about giving Alucard a "reward" for saving the world from Dracula, there is literally nothing that foreshadows that they'd think of sex.

Hector's scene with Lenore in the cell in episode 4 made me rant a ton about needless changes, so much that I had to make a separate post. But I'm not done! Did you expect anything else? :P

Lenore keeps being infuriatingly smug and condescending, mostly when she takes Hector for "walkies". This is not manipulation: this is only humiliation and fetish. I genuinely do not understand how Hector started to crush on her. Once again, this doesn't come off as him falling for a person who gives him the most basic of kindness. He just has a boner. (the scene of the balcony is better manipulation, I concede, but I struggle why Hector would fall for someone who is basically saying "you're lucky you got beaten to death")

I spoke about the ring here and here. Long story short, after Hector noticed it on Lenore's hand, she could have either slipped it on him while they were sitting close, or directly gifted it to him. He, for some incomprehensible reason, has grown to trust her at this point. Yes, he wanted to be left out, but clearly it doesn't take long to convince him to do anything. Lenore could have used her charm once more instead of immediately resorting to sex. She is a rapist who only wanted to get dicked down, and I won't stop repeating it.

Isaac is infuriating, as usual. I despise how much of a Creator's Pet he is. Unlike Hector, who is framed as being so weak and powerless that he wouldn't be able to survive on his own (unlike... how he had been doing since he was ten?), Isaac has reached the point where he can just stibby stabby everyone and boom instant army. Miranda as a character literally only exists to give him a very convenient solution for his only problem left: reaching Styria with his army. Yes, also as a parallel to Isaac, as she feels responsible for not being able to save the other villagers much like Isaac regrets not being able to protect Dracula (as the show conveniently reminds us by showing us the flashback, thank you for assuming we're idiots), but really, it's all so convenient for him. It's irritating and unfair. Why does he deserve to have such an easy life, when every other character ends up suffering in this season?

The scene with FlysEyes also is starting to bother me. This dude takes about 5 minutes to explain, with excruciating slowness, that CHURCH BAD and humans bad. It makes Isaac's eventual Enlightment™ even more out of nowhere.

As an extra, the conversation between Striga and Morana on the balcony is a pathetic attempt to flesh out two superfluous characters. Who cares that Striga "can't shake the past"? Whomst the fuck is she? This line is never brought up again. Who cares that they're sad that Carmilla "still has nightmares"? We never see them, Carmilla is not allowed to have a moment of weakness. Morana being excited about Carmilla's insane plan doesn't make her look like an "organizer", either, Striga is way more practical than she is.

I do like however that they take the time to shittalk about Lenore for absolutely no reason.

Morana: It's because of Carmilla that we got to fall in love in a fairy-tale castle. Striga: Oh, God, Morana. You sound like Lenore.

Not only because she deserves it :P but it's an interesting parallel with Hector who got this same treatment, and it justifies her suicide later on. Not even her sisters respect her, as shown before when Carmilla mockingly remembers when she wanted to take care of a spider, and especially shown in S4E6 where Striga and Morana immediately assume Lenore is dead and don't seem particularly concerned about it. I'd feel bad for her, if she weren't a disgusting rapist. You deserve this mockery and much worse, bestie. Ah, in a just world, Lenector would be an intriguing ship based on mutual respect in a world that doesn't, and is not... well, what we know.

(also this is another case of show don't tell. This exchange implies Lenore is a hopeless romantic, but she's never shown to be like that; on the contrary, she's shrewd and more than willing to use feelings for her own advantage. Either these two never exchanged a word with Lenore and just assume that she's cutesy because of her appearance... or this is just another instance of bad writing. And I don't trust like that anymore.)

Rewatching NFCV with @woodchipp and @the-crow-binary has been miserable so far.

Not because of them, of course: we all need each other to bear the Peak. but holy shit I forgot how mindnumbingly boring the show is. it's way worse at a second watch because now I know how much it falls apart! We're only at S2E3 as of this post!

S1 is the best season, and even that is largely forgettable, especially S1E3 which wastes 22 minutes of my life to say "here's the bishop. he's proof that CHURCH BAD". But S1E1 may be the best or second best episode of the whole show thanks to Dracula and his performance... and isn't that sad, that the show peaks at the very beginning? The rest of the show is just... Trevor doing his stuff (while the framing mostly makes fun of him), talking, some fighting, and CHURCH BAD. As positives, I still like Trevor's mini-arc in this season, and the vague effort to be faithful to CV3 (Sypha being petrified by a cyclops, falling down a chasm to find Alucard).

S2 is terrible. Yes we're still less than halfway through. I already hate everything.

I hate Alucard becoming a legend to the point that the Wallachians name his Alucard (as in, Dracula's opposite) after only a year - why couldn't he name himself Alucard? Why complicate matters so much? Isaac calling him Alucard, and Dracula recognizing the name, makes absolutely no sense: how do they know about it? Dracula lost contact with his son one year ago and I doubt Wallachian human legends have reached him. And Isaac was in the Sahara until sometime after Lisa died!

I hate Alucard himself. He's a cunt. He does nothing but insult Trevor and the Belmonts without provocation, and it's not funny banter, he's mean! He's genuinely cruel! He hears that Trevor lost his family at 12, and he can only say "lol and lmao I had more of a childhood than you. anyway they were mentally ill and child killers, they sacrificed chickens and hoarded dead cats". And this piece of shit is the most popular character of the show??? he's not even pretty what are y'all seeing 😭

(it's also weird how he's all angsting about killing his vampire father, but he hates the Belmont for being vampire hunters. bro. bro you're also about to hunt a vampire. why are you defending a race of monsters so staunchly. not even a hint of, I don't know, a Belmont hurting him when he was a child because he was confused for a full vampire? Remember that logically, a vampire child is a child turned into a vampire, we have no other indication that dhampirs are running all around the world. I know that in the games he seems fully on board with "vampires bad and me bad for being half vampire", but you have the chance of making it better and you squander it?)

Sypha is also ruder than I remembered. I think she suddenly became more cheerful in S3 and that's why I liked her, but also girl, you keep criticizing Trevor for being rude and not consoling you, but you look at him with a perpetual resting bitch face and insult the Morning Star calling it an "ugly thing"? Why does Trevor even bother with the likes of you? How is Trephacard the most popular ship in the franchise?

I hate Isaac. Oh, I gave him the benefit of the doubt back then, because I really wanted to understand why he became the fan favorite. But now? No, I'm sorry, he's overrated as fuck. He's so damn pretentious, his speech about how he wants a pure world without love is terrible from the lens of him being a Muslim who is devoted to the Devil, and his backstory is so tryhard and historically inaccurate that I almost prefer Hector's past being exposed through voiceover.

Oh, and Hector, I hate his scenes. Because he's actually treated with dignity. He's fine! I actually like the guy! I like the scene where he rebukes Godbrand (who as a character only exists to attract infodumps and to question Dracula) because "I have to work" - he sounds actually proud of his role, if not even competent, perish the thought. Also by reading the scripts online I forgot that he was the one who yelled "you do not question my loyalty!". Which I like a lot? I can hear the real Hector protesting like that out of pride, even if in private he would admit that he disagrees with the bloodshed. And the scene where he soothes the newborn Night Creature... yeah, this character used to be written with respect, and knowing how he gets tortured and disrespected and used for rape apologism by a sex pest hurts even more. Also, in retrospect, the scene where he stares at the fire while reminiscing about the day he set fire on his own childhood home doesn't go anywhere, even as the finale of S3 echoes it :^)

And Dracula, oh my poor man Dracula. He's already being presented as an ineffectual depressed old man spending his time staring at a fireplace, who can't even command his presence in the war room, who allows Carmilla to insult him and Lisa in front of everyone - it's so embarrassing how he gets the Red Eyes of Fury and then he simply... lets her go after he gets the flimsy explanation of "yeah I humiliated you because everyone is asking themselves the same question. I wanted to help <3" girl (Dracula), she's a mere regional ruler, as she herself said??? why do you need her so much that you allow her to do this shit??????? oh but then you posture to godbrand, he gets to be threatened because... he's not relevant to the plot i guess. fucking pathetic. what have they done to my man.

(and I hate Carmilla. but that has never changed. annoying smug ass #girlboss with the charisma of spoiled seafood. her way of manipulating Hector isn't even manipulation, it's just her telling him very plainly what she wants him to do. She and Lenore utterly suck at their job, and they only get their way because muh plot)

And then there's the infodumping. Oh my god these people won't shut the fuck up. Godbrand is like "why should we listen to two humans?" and Dracula dumps twice that he trusts Hector and Isaac for their human nature (which, again, it's a decent reasoning, but it goes on and on and even they should know, I get it). Alucard dumps about the apocalyptic scenario where Dracula wins and rules over a world without humans... but he only describes it as we look into his ugly face, instead of doing something more creative like actually showing what would happen. Hector gets this random flashback-through-sound, shoved there as if Ellis didn't know where to put it in the script; later on he explains to Carmilla the origin of Night Creatures, as if ever remotely matters. Isaac dumps about his jihadist philosophy about how by killing humans he and Dracula will create a pure world. Carmilla randomly reveals her Tragic Backstory after kicking Godbrand down the stairs, another scene I can't stand because it's all about what a #queen she is and how she's better than Dracula. At one point they seriously discuss about the myth of vampires unable to cross running water, which is a moot point anyway because Carmilla resorts to using a zombie bishop to bless the river!! No I will never let it go!!!

(also I love that in the one occasion where Alucard has the chance of describing his childhood, he retells the tale of Lisa meeting Dracula, something we've already seen and he was also obviously told about, not something he experienced himself. They couldn't even come up with another anedocte to actually tell us what kind of mother Lisa used to be. so lazy)

This show is half people sitting in a circle and talking, and half average fight scenes. Yeah at this point not even those impress me anymore. I'm serious when I say that Knuckles' fight scene in Divergence, also animated by Powerhouse Animation Studios, is of a better quality than what the show has offered.

And this is why I'm so reluctant to watch Nocturne. If the best seasons of this highly acclaimed show are so painful to sit through, how are we going to survive a sequel series that not even the fans liked it as much?

[nobodyfamousposts]

Marinette’s Lament

Marinette would be lying if she said she never considered it before.

The Wish.

The ultimate power. Born of the unification of the Miraculous of the Ladybug and the Black Cat. Creation and Destruction. The ability to ask for anything—to even remake the world!

There had been times…a number of them, actually, where she had considered using the Wish.

For personal reasons.

For less than selfless purposes.

But never had the temptation been greater than after the loss of Master Fu.

It would have been so easy. Chat knew Fu and was also upset by what had happened. And he had also been inclined to using the Miraculous for more selfish purposes. Odds were that he would be on board with using the Wish to restore their mentor. They could easily work together to make the Wish. And given how much the kwamis missed him, they wouldn’t protest too much if it meant he was restored.

But this feeling…this pain…this hollowness…

She couldn’t Wish it on anyone. She couldn’t. No matter how much she missed him and wanted him back. Knowing someone else would suffer in his place and who knows how many more would suffer in hers…

Fu would never have wanted her to do it. And more than having her mentor and uncle figure back, she wasn’t sure she could take him being disappointed in her.

So she did her utmost to accept his final words and put her all into being the new Guardian and protecting the city.

Or…trying to.

But it felt like no matter what she did, she was messing up. Chloe’s betrayal. Letting the kwamis free. The breakup with Luka. The fight with her friends. Revealing her identity to Alya. The growing tension with Chat.

And now…

She could barely breathe as she shifted through the rubble of what had once been her room. Her family’s home.

Paris was decimated.

Her home was destroyed.

And the Miracle Box was in Hawk Moth’s hands.

Of course—of fucking course!

She’d known it was a matter of time before Hawk Moth would do something. But she hadn’t thought he would go this far.

The Miraculous and kwamis were gone.

She had no idea what had happened to any of her allies.

And Chat…

She opened her fist.

A black ring sat in the palm of her hand.

Always sacrificing himself to help her. That was just like him.

…but she would have preferred to have him there. Maybe even Wish for him?

Well, for that or to defeat Hawk Moth so it wouldn’t be necessary. It had been over a year and they had made no progress in finding the man and taking back the Miraculous. Nooroo and Dusuu have been stuck in his grasp all this time and there was no telling what he had put them through. And all Ladybug and Chat Noir could do was fight off his akumas whenever he sent them out—and pray that this one wouldn’t be the one to take them down. It may have been overkill to use the Wish, but wouldn’t it have been worth it if it meant putting an end to his reign of terror?

No.

Fu had already explained it to her. It wouldn’t give her what she wanted. It would only shuffle things around to give her the bare minimum of what she had asked for. Maybe Hawk Moth wouldn’t be attacking the city anymore, but that didn’t mean someone else wouldn’t get the Butterfly Miraculous and attack the city instead. Or that it wouldn’t be someone even worse.

How unfair…

Magic always seemed to work in any way that was against her.

Hawk Moth had no time limit. He could create multiple akumas at once that could do literally anything he could think of. If she made akuma-blocking charms, he could just break through them.

It had been a war of attrition and she had failed to make any progress.

Huh…story of her life.

And it looked like this was the end of that story anyway. Hawk Moth had donned all of the other Miraculous and proceeded to launch a full scale attack on the city. Entire buildings had been leveled. Who knew how many were dead?

At least she had managed to get away with the Ring. And she still had the earrings—but who knew how long she’d manage even that much before he found her? 

“Hey.”

What could she even do against the combined might all of the other Miraculous? Especially by herself?! She would only be able to use her Lucky Charm once before she’d be on a time limit. There would be no escaping to try again—if she even got that far.

He had the Snake—whatever plan she made, he could just use it to rewind time and make them pointless.

Or he could use the Rabbit to go back in time and steal the Miraculous sooner and she wouldn’t have any way of knowing he did it, much less stop him!

“Hey!”

How was she supposed to do this? She was alone!

All she had were two Miraculous and no allies! She was just a kid so she still had so many disadvantages as it was! And she was a kid! None of this should ever have been put in her hands in the first place! Why hadn’t she given the Miracle Box to Su-han when she had the chance? Or agree to give up being Ladybug and go to New York? Or give the earrings to—

“HEY!”

The voice broke through her spiral of thoughts, drawing her gaze and focus to the black cat kwami floating before her. 

“Plagg.”

Of course. She had the Ring, so he was still there. So…so she wasn’t completely alone, right?

Still outnumbered and outgunned though.

Her direct interactions with Chat Noir’s kwami had been limited. But from their brief meetings, he had seemed pretty laid-back and full of wit and humor.

His expression now…it was the most serious she had ever seen him.

“Listen, I know things are bad right now.” He said holding his arms out in a placating gesture. “But we’re not out yet! We can still make a move.”

“What move can I possibly make?!” She demanded. She had tried to keep her voice down to avoid being discovered in case Hawk Moth or anyone was around to hear, but that didn’t stop the harshness in her voice.

She couldn’t help it. She was angry and hurt and guilty and frustrated and just so stressed and she knew she shouldn’t be taking it out on Plagg because it wasn’t his fault, but it was taking everything she had not to break down and she was already crying as it was!

“Hawk Moth was bad enough with just the Butterfly, but I can’t fight him now that he’s using all of the other Miraculous! I’m still on a timer and there is no Lucky Charm that could fix this! It’s just me! I can’t do this by myself!”

A pause followed. Long and empty just as their surroundings were.

As if realizing something, Plagg sighed and shook his head.

“You’re too used to this.”

“What?” She asked, confused.

“Your words. ‘Me’. ‘I’. 'By Myself'. Like you have to do this on your own. You do realize it’s not just you here, right?”

She blinked, startled.

Plagg frowned.

“I’m here. And Tikki is here. We’re here with you.”

He floated up to her.

“You’re not alone.”

He went so far as to bop her nose.

“You don’t have to carry everything by yourself. We can help you if you let us.”

She wiped a tear away.

It was a nice sentiment…

…but the circumstances wouldn’t allow her to enjoy it.

“So what are our options then?” She finally asked.

“Well, if there’s any time to go all out, this is is. So option one is that I use my…” He hesitated. “Well, my you-know-what power. Let it loose and take out everything. Even with all of the Miraculous, Hawk Moth likely wouldn’t be able to survive the onslaught.”

“Unless he uses the Rabbit or Horse to escape.” Marinette pointed out. “And there would be the issue of how to undo the damage afterwards without ending up back in the same situation. Especially if I’m right here next to you when you use it.”

He shrugged sheepishly. “Yeah, there is that. Option two is that you detransform and let Tikki use HER power uncontrolled.”

That brought up the memory of Galette Day and Tikki’s attempt at making the world’s largest galette. Marinette winced and shook her head. “I don’t know what a giant Lucky Charm can accomplish.”

“You’d be surprised.” He muttered.

“Please tell me there’s a third option.” She half pled.

Plagg gave her a strange grin at that.

“Option three is you use both of us together.”

She froze.

Because there was only one reason to combine the Ladybug and Black Cat Miraculous. Only one thing that could result of that specific combination…

“No…you mean making the Wish?”

She could barely whisper it. Just…it was too much. How could that even be an option?

“Our options are kind of limited right now.” He argued. “And if there was anything that would make it warranted, I’d think the current situation would count!”

“But Su-Han—” She fumbled, trying to get out the words.

“Isn’t here and did a shit job as Guardian anyway.” Plagg cut her off, bitingly.

She rose up in defense.

“But he—and Fu—”

“Did so much wrong that we don’t have time to argue about!” Plagg insisted, gesturing out to the dystopian wasteland that was once Paris. “Hawk Moth is still active and going to make his way here sooner or later.”

She bit her lip.

He wasn’t wrong. And as much as she wanted to defend both men, it was more to ignore the implications of the choice she’d have to make.

Because this wasn’t the time to hesitate. Hawk Moth was on his way and if she was going to even begin to try to make up for what she’d caused, Plagg was right and she needed to make a choice and act.

“What about Tikki?” She murmured.

What would the little red kwami think? How would she feel about Marinette using her to make the Wish? Would it be selfish of her? Would she say it was wrong?

Shouldn’t she detransform and ask her? Let her decide?

…at least have one last chance to talk to her before…the end?

Plagg rushed up and put a hand over her lips.

“Look, the way things are going, a Wish is going to be made today. I would rather it be made by you than him.” He spat out the last word with such disgust that it made her recoil.

“Are…are you sure?” She asked uncertainly.

Because this wasn’t just an overuse of their power. This was bigger than her using a Lucky Charm for a selfish reason. This was…world-changing.

Did she really have the right?

Plagg shook his head.

“Either you make the Wish or he does, and I don’t want a world where he gets to win and just wipe his slate clean!”

“But what should I Wish for?”

“I don’t care!” He shouted before remembering where they were and lowering his voice once more, but losing none of the bite. “Wish to be a Princess! Wish to be a fashionista! Wish for your ‘Dandelion’ to be your boyfriend! Just Wish for something before he does!”

She balked.

She couldn’t just...not just out of the blue like that! Not for something that simple!

"Plagg! That's not helpful! What do you think will make the situation better? What makes the situation bad that needs the world to rewritten to be fixed?”

He seemed surprised at that.

“Well, Wish for Hawk Moth to never find the Miraculous then!”

That was a tempting thought.

However…

She shook her head. Her brain was going a mile a minute and while she was trying not to start spiraling again, she couldn’t stop herself from considering all of the possible ways such a Wish could go wrong.

Because if it was that easy...wouldn’t Fu have done it? Or Su-Han? Or any of the other Guardians? Wouldn’t Tikki and Plagg have suggested it sooner?

“Then what would happen to them?” She countered. “What if someone else found the Miraculous? Someone who becomes an even greater villain? At least with Hawk Moth we know where he is and what to expect.”

Better the devil you knew, after all…

And besides, there was that other hidden caveat. What Master Fu had told her once before…

“The Wish comes with a price, doesn’t it?” She asked him. “What if I Wish for something and things are even worse somehow?”

She couldn’t imagine anything worse than the current mess, but…every time she thought things were bad enough, something always seemed to happen to surprise her and she just…she just couldn’t…not with this!

He watched her helplessly. The silence between them suffocating.

Until…

“I can’t answer that.” He finally said, almost sadly. “The Wish is different for everybody. Not just what they Wish for but what the results are. I can’t tell you what will happen. Just that things will be different—they’ll have to be.” He looked up at her.

“YOU will have to be.”

She couldn’t help the tears falling.

“I just…what if I mess it up? What if I make it worse?”

“A bit of advice, Pigtails.” He said, patting her head gently. “It’ll only be as bad as you make it.”

She smiled weakly back at him.

“And…how do I make it better?”

It was cheating, wasn’t it? To consider a plan to redo it all was bad enough, but to ask for a hint on top of it. She really was the worst.

Plagg only smirked. “Someone who asks for once. Clever girl.”

He floated to eye level in front of her.

“The Wish isn’t just about giving. It’s also taking. Not just from some random stranger, but from you.” He gave her a bitter smile. “You’re creating a new reality…which means you’re rejecting the current one and the reason things got to this point. So you need to avoid the same mistakes. You’ll need to think outside the box.”

He winked at her.

“You’re good at that, Pigtails. I know you’ll be fine.”

He looked up at her, his green eyes just as bright as his.

“Just go into this with fresh eyes and be open to the changes as they are. It’s a new start, after all.”

She wiped away a tear. “Like you?” She asked with a small smile.

He grinned. “Hey, I’m a cat. When we can, we go with the flow. Maybe you should try it. Never know what might happen.”

His gaze hardened.

“But if we’re going to do something, we need to do it now.”

She gave a quiet sob but nodded.

For Paris.

For Chat.

For the kwamis.

For everyone that she had let down.

If a Wish could spare them all this pain, didn’t she owe it to them to try?

If there was a price to pay…well, it was the least she could do.

She forced herself to her feat and wiped at her eyes. It gave her a moment to think, at least. About what she would do.

What she should Wish for.

The Ring slid onto her finger without sound or resistance, but she could swear she felt something like a key in a lock. 

She wasn’t sure if it was in her head.

She wasn’t sure it was a good thing.

“Ladybug.”

She looked back to him.

He was staring up at her. Worried. Uncertain. And strangely remorseful.

But before he could speak, he stopped, eyes going wide before he flew in close to her.

Just as the sound of footsteps approached her from behind.

The tension in the air told her who it was before he even spoke.

And sure enough, when she turned, it was him.

Hawk Moth...Shadow Moth...Ultra Moth? She didn’t even know anymore. The man now wore all of the Miraculous. From the original Butterfly and Peacock he had been using to the Fox, the Bee, the Turtle, all of the Zodiac as well. How he even managed to use them so brazenly and retain his sanity, she wasn’t sure. Perhaps it was only out of single-minded purpose? What led him to find her. What started his horrible crusade in the first place.

And she knew...

They were out of time.

“It’s over.” He stated coldly. And how could he be so cold? This was an entire city destroyed for his goals! A city she’d assumed had been his home as much as hers.

But his focus remained ever set on the Miraculous.

“Hand them over.” He ordered. “Give the Miraculous to me and let this be over. I can undo all of it once my Wish is made.”

She glared back at him.

“You can’t wipe away your crimes that easy. Even if you made the Wish and undid it all, you would still have to carry the weight of your actions.”

And even if the people didn’t remember…the world would not let him forget.

If nothing else, she was sure of that.

Hawk Moth merely looked down at her, clearly unconcerned with her warning. Such things were beneath him, after all. Likely seeing them as nothing more than the final words of a child who refused to give up when she was beaten.

He didn’t care. Not about this city. Or this world.

“Then that is something I will deal with. Once my Wish is made.”

In that moment, she understood why Plagg had been so against the prospect of him making the Wish. So much so that he would gladly let anyone else do so instead.

She couldn’t blame him.

He walked closer, closing the distance between them and shoving aside any obstacle in his path.

She glared. She couldn’t run. There was nowhere left to go. And even if she could deny him his victory, she couldn’t just abandon Paris. It was her home. And even if she could escape and protect the Earrings and Ring...as much as she wanted to keep Plagg and Tikki safe...

No.

She had to see this through.

So that was why she remained in place as he approached and finally came to a stop before her.

“Don’t despair.” He said, softly. “Children should never have been chosen for a role they had no chance of accomplishing in the first place.”

For all he may have spoke sincerely, it only came out as mocking to her. Because he was right. Children should never have been drawn into this mess. Heaven knew that being Ladybug had ruined much of her life.

But who was the one responsible for this to begin with? And for him to act as if he truly felt any sympathy? As though he could understand what she had been through? What HE had put her through?

It was laughable.

“Give them to me.” He demanded. “You have no options left.”

No.

There was still one way…

“Tikki. Plagg. Unify.”

The look of shock and outrage on his face was the one bit of vindication she would hold onto even in the new world.

But she didn’t have enough time to appreciate it before it 

all...

........went...

…...................black.

_______________

Ladies and Gentlemen.

Tonight will be the final performance of Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug and Chat Noir, as we will bid a fond farewell to Marinette Dupain-Cheng, who will be retiring from her role as Ladybug in pursuit of other interests.

She has been a joy to work with these many seasons, and she shall be missed as the spotted hero we’ve come to know and love for so long. We thank her for her contribution to the production and everything that made it great. Please wish her well in her future endeavors.

This is not the end of our show, however, as it has been decided that Miraculous will move forward in another direction.

Thank you for your understanding and please stay tuned for more Tales of Miraculous.

[djrenard]

Titans East (a post-Dark Crisis on Infinite Earths team):

Thoughts: Operating out of Nightwing’s bunkers on the East Coast, a small community of Titans protect the most vulnerable as they gather around millionaire philanthropist Dick Grayson’s Haven outreach in urban centers. I’d love to see the We Are Robin kids again, The Movement, The Green Team, and Gotham Academy alumni. The Terror Titans and their meta-human fighting rings would present worthy conflict for the team.

Bunker (Miguel Barragan) will take the psychological barriers that he’s internalized and literally throw them in your face, brick by brick. He defines his own barriers, makes them true…and then tears them down when he gets bored.

The Signal: Duke Thomas just knows what he needs to be doing; exposing injustice, inconsistencies, and lies; shining a light on what others might overlook.

Bolt (Alinta) sprints away from her trauma filled past. Ever looking forward and never quite settled, she throws herself into her new identity before properly dealing with the betrayals of her past.

Blue Jay II (Jack Abrams): His father (Jay Abrams) is an avian, size-changing, multiversal traveler. His mother is a deserter of the Thanagarian special forces. Together they’re an unlikely couple who found love and hid it away in the heart of America.

Indigo (Brainiac 8): For the fourth time she has pieced herself back together. This time however, she chooses to exercise her creator’s hold over her in the process. Will it take? Can she be trusted? Yeah. She’s actually a pretty decent person.

Red Devil (Eddie Bloomberg) chose to change his physical form to better match how he felt on the inside, and he has zero patience for the shame you lobe his way. He does have a sense of humor about it though.

Chlorophyll Kid (Ral Benem) is a joke in the future, the 31st century to be exact, but he’s willing to put in the work to change that opinion. While searching for other plant elementals to guide him and to grow his power, he instead finds a whole community willing to nurture him.

Stitch sees the wider view of things, how it all comes together…but how do they fit into that grand design?

[wawagooba]

The Franklin scandal fucks me up in a way that’s just different from a lot of clandestine government conspiracy stuff I delve into. Maybe it’s the horrifying imagery, or the vast scope of who was involved. The complete, existential bleakness surrounding the whole premise: That the highest reaches of government could not only be aware of but participate in systemized child rape for profit and political leverage. But what bothers me most about the Franklin conspiracy was that it really happened.

The Franklin Federal Credit Union Pedophile Ring

The scandal itself involves a national, possibly international, pedophile ring centered around Larry King, the Republican manager of the Franklin Federal Credit Union (FFCU), based in Omaha, Neb. In the ‘80s (but likely before), King cultivated and procured a stable of children to be used as child sex slaves, drug traffickers, tools of blackmail and sacrifices. King financially ingratiated himself in Boys Town, an orphan educational complex run by the archdiocese and granted the privileges of an incorporated town, in order to gain access to the youth. He ferried children from Boys Town to FFCU, and then trafficked them to pedophilic orgies around town. This abuse eventually gave way to reports — along with suspicions of financial embezzlement that directly fueled the sex parties — that reached the proper (and I want to stress, for the documentary’s sake, the Herculean lifting “proper” is doing here) authorities. On April 11, 1988, the FBI raided and closed FFCU.

What follows is a profoundly sad story of betrayal, murder and court narratives that deliver a litany of torture and sexual abuse, but more than that, Conspiracy of Silence (CoS) is an example of an American capitalist sub-system that reproduces itself through exploitation, blackmail and violent suppression: If everyone’s doing the same illegal thing, everyone can hold each other accountable for it, and from there you can extract, from participants, political, monetary and material gain while continuing to abuse people yourself. Who’s going to stop you, the people who’re supposed to stop you? They’re doing it too.

From Post-Franklin to Post-Epstein

Looking at it from afar, the Franklin Scandal seems tailor-made to be disbelieved: The most powerful men in the state and country, those in politics, law enforcement, industry and media, terrorizing the most vulnerable of our citizens for the sake of carnal satisfaction and Satanic ritual abuse (SRA). Shit, and Iran-Contra might’ve been involved? AND George Bush, Sr. (who the documentary doesn’t explicitly mention but is identified by one of the witnesses)??

Who would take that seriously? Who could? To accept the Franklin scandal on its own terms requires a complete restructuring of your entire worldview and values.

Approaching it more closely, however, it’s hard to just wave away how much weird shit is going on here: The mysterious deaths of those involved; the punishment of those who believed the story, including the excessively cruel sentencing of Alisha Owen, whose staunch testimony identified several key public figures in court; the fact that there were charges in court regarding prostitution; that the court acknowledged abuse occurred; that there were publicized records of politicos giving “escorts” after-hours White House tours.

But it’s impossible to ignore Conspiracy of Silence’s most prominent feature: That it was made in the mid-90s.

We’ve had a good quarter-century since then to digest not only the Franklin scandal (whose total viewer numbers I’d love to see but is probably impossible to quantify),

but the Dutroux scandal; the Clinton scandal; the Bryan Singer scandal; the Weinstein scandal; the Epstein scandal; the Prince Andrew scandal; literally dozens of scandals involving the Catholic Church all over the world since the big story broke back in 2002 (and it bears mentioning these stories were reported far earlier); the Celeste Guap sex trafficking scandal, which involved multiple police departments in the Bay Area sex trafficking a teenager; scandals involving our current and last sitting presidents; the sheer multitude of celebrity, political, military, international, athletic, you name it sex scandals that’ve come out, just so many fucking scandals that indicate well-furbished multi-generational networks of oligarchical abusers that is constantly regurgitating itself; hell there’s even the Cleveland Street scandal going all the way back to 1889; finally, over the last few years, there has been newfound interest in Operations Gladio and MK Ultra, both which incorporate sexual espionage, manipulation and abuse.

Most recently we’ve seen the grotesque reconciliation that Afghanistan, with all its own instances of West-perpetuated war crimes and rape, was a massive pre-ordained scam (or, if you’re a true believer, a military failure, though both conclusions should take into account the human misery involved and meanwhile, those who profited will never know any of it) designed to destabilize entire countries while enriching the U.S. I risk adding to the memeification of what is a key historical event but: Look up Operation Cyclone.

We live in a world where Law & Order: SVU will enter its 23rd season later this year and it’s not hard to trace that show’s source material to real life (the show has also been renewed for a 24th). The show even featured an Epstein episode all the way back in 2011.

What I’m getting at is: I’m not sure how you could dismiss the Franklin Scandal wholesale without at least even considering the possibility that it could be real.

In the Enemy de Camp

John de Camp was a Republican senator, lawyer, and Vietnam vet who sought to expose the Franklin cover-up, which, by the documentary’s end, he believes has been primarily orchestrated by the FBI. CoS prominently features de Camp as its main subject and de facto hero. He is, after all, the one who wrote “The Franklin Cover-Up.”

After watching this, I’m leaning toward de Camp being part of the whole thing, a paperweight op or something to keep the door ajar without blowing it wide open. There’s just too much weird shit going on with him:

- He himself spent time at Boys Town in his youth (CoS thankfully gets that little morsel right out of the way instead of saving it for a cheap thrill at the end of the documentary)

- De Camp’s name has been associated with Operation Phoenix (per his own biography at the end of The Franklin Cover-Up), a Vietnam military strategy that basically gave soldiers the green light to brutalize innocents through rape and torture (does this sound like a pattern yet?)

- De Camp acted as lawyer to Sen. Loran Schmit, a corn farmer and head of the Franklin Committee, who investigated the abuses. He convinced Schmit to turn over evidence to the FBI, some of which was subsequently lost in federal possession (whoops!)

- De Camp also claims in his bio that he initiated Operation Babylift, wherein a ton of orphans were forcibly evacuated from Vietnam. However, the one citation on his Wikipedia page linking him to that on his, an early aughts doc called Daughter of Danang, doesn’t mention de Camp by name. To the best of my knowledge there’s nothing linking de Camp to Babylift other than his own insistence.

- Per his obituary, de Camp was an assistant to an Iranian geologist in his youth, which would have been in the 50s, which, well there was a lot of shit going on between the CIA and Iran in the 50s.

- One segment that stands out is when Schmit says his faith in government institutions has been shaken, and a few minutes later there's a contrived 1-on-1 scene with de Camp and Troy Boner (a victim and witness who met his own death under mysterious circumstances in 2003-4) where de Camp implores him to "use institutions of government that’ve been set up to protect you and make them work.” Maybe it’s just dramatic juxtaposition on the editor’s part but it gave me pause, an instance where I felt the documentary was trying to communicate de Camp was insincere

- This annoys me the most, but the crew couldn’t interview a local authority figure involved in the case worth a damn, but William fucking Colby, director of the CIA (who’d meet his own suspect end in 1996), and a personal “friend” to de Camp (he was Colby’s aide while the latter acted as a diplomat to Vietnam), gets his own interview? Incidentally, also one of the few doc subjects who gets his own title cards lol

So what would the point of having de Camp as the star of this sordid nightmare if he also had an actionable role in it? Maybe to give it an air of legitimacy — there was a whole trial, after all, and Larry King did go to prison, and the court decided that the witnesses had been abused, just not by King and whoever — while also neutralizing its effect on the public imagination as a whole (not that he needed the help; the Omaha Herald, whose staff included perpetrator Peter Citron, did a bang-up job of steamrolling the witnesses and portraying them as opportunistic grifters and addicts). Maybe because de Camp’s goofy improv school delivery and subsequent stunts — he acted as God’s lawyer in a stupid mock trail regarding free speech in 2009 — ensured that the casual viewer wouldn’t take him seriously. Either way, not a huge fan.

De Camp was, in all likelihood, a limited hangout. According to former special assistant to the Deputy Director of the CIA Victor Marchetti, a limited hangout is "spy jargon for a favorite and frequently used gimmick of the clandestine professionals. When their veil of secrecy is shredded and they can no longer rely on a phony cover story to misinform the public, they resort to admitting—sometimes even volunteering—some of the truth while still managing to withhold the key and damaging facts in the case. The public, however, is usually so intrigued by the new information that it never thinks to pursue the matter further." (Paragraphs 1-6, but also check out the case while you’re there)

The real heroes for me are Alisha Owens, who received a heavier sentence than her perpetrators, and investigator Gary Caradori, who died in a mysterious plane crash along with his 8-year-old son after obtaining a damning piece of evidence against King and his cohorts (his partner, investigator Karen Ormiston appears in the documentary but offers no real useful insight into that event or her own experiences in the case, which surprised me given her partner was straight up mur—I mean died).

John de Camp also looks like Bobby Moynihan from Saturday Night Live which is kinda funny (by the way, how have SNL alumni Horatio Sanz and Jimmy Fallon

been doing recently?)

A Vision of Henry Vinson

Adding this section strictly because Henry Vinson is one of the stranger figures in this whole saga, mostly because he’s still alive.

A former D.C. pimp (his preferred term is madam), Vinson only gets one mention toward the end of CoS as having been arrested as part of a prostitution sting. In Vinson’s own memoir, “Memoirs of a D.C. Madam,” he claims he was approached by King and Craig Spence, a prominent Republican lobbyist, to provide boys for potential clients but he declined. He faced RICO charges but accepted a plea deal on the advice of his attorney, former Fox News anchor Greta Van Sustern (he also gratefully mentions in tweets that she introduced him to Scientology, which, lol), whereupon he served 63 months in a federal prison.

He was involved either tangentially or deeply, but is still (fairly) active on social media. His whole timeline is amazing, by the way: Years of normalcy from about 2012 to 2015, followed by a long self-promotional period leading up to his memoir, and from there a bunch of significant claims: That Bill Casey, former CIA director, was both a client of his and friends with Craig Spence, who, before I forget, was later found dead in a hotel room under suspect circumstances. Vinson also claims Dennis Hastert was the “victim” of blackmail (lol), and teases that other powerful figures feature in his memoir.

These days it looks like Vinson just acts like a milquetoast anti-Trump liberal. But there’s definitely an element of deception in his whole online presence. The RT/L (retweet/likes) ratios get hilariously skewed as his timeline progresses, and according to an account audit site, 75% of his follows are fake anyway, making me think his whole thing was just a branding exercise during his 2015 push to get recognition for his memoir.

He mentions Larry King (as Lawrence King, which is uncommon as far as how other sources refer to him throughout this whole case) only in one tweet.

Whether he’s a key player or feckless grifter is up for you to decide but he’s certainly worth mentioning. It's also like, if he's saying all this wild shit while living a life of relative ease why haven't they offed him yet but I digress.

An excerpt of his book can be read here, in a 2015 piece by The Advocate. Vinson co-authored his memoir with none other than Nick Bryant, who’s own book on the Franklin scandal, simply titled “The Franklin Scandal,” is to date the most recent comprehensive piece of literature on the event.

Vinson currently runs a funeral parlor and is an avid aviator, both occupations I find morbidly interesting given how often death and flights come up in witness testimonies.

21st Century Franklins

Even today suppression efforts still seem visible: The documentary still has not aired; it was mysteriously pulled from broadcast in 1994 by the discovery channel and supposedly later mailed to de Camp. The Franklin scandal Wikipedia page bears precious little text despite a wealth of narratives and transcriptions existing on the net, and also seems designed to dissuade interest in the event, calling everything involved "allegations" right of the bat. User Acroterion ripped a ton of resources off the site and seems to have made up their mind the whole thing is a hoax. And I know I’m making several leaps in logic by bringing up the Panama Papers, but the journalist who spearheaded that story did die, as did the son of one of the judges overseeing the case. Silence under the penalty of extrajudicial murder is a common motif that’s brought up by the witnesses throughout CoS. There exist threads online that consolidate the deaths surrounding the case that I have not linked to because I could not corroborate them. Far as I’m concerned you really need to know about Caradori’s death anyway.

Alisha Owens is out of prison and still alive, best I can tell. Boner’s dead, and he’s certainly not the only one. Paul Bonacci was sent jail for molesting his cousin, unsure what he’s doing now. Many of the major players in the documentary never faced significant repercussions for their crimes. In fact, many of them received promotions.

Larry King, for his part, appears to be enjoying retirement. And yes, that thread is worth checking out.

”Fuck, man . . .”

CoS is a crisp 60 minutes, and effectively tells its story in that amount of time. It’s not just a hard documentary to watch thematically, however, but also visually. The quality is poor, the interview tapes are grainy, and it’s terrible at identifying its interview subjects. The narration is solid but at times feels superflouous, and I’ve already mentioned my issues with the documentary centering de Camp (I wonder if they tried interviewing Owens?). I do NOT care for the Twin Peaks soundtrack, and frankly having no soundtrack would've been aesthetically and thematically more appropriate. Plus, its shady broadcast history — or lack thereof — confuses analysis, though I’m in the “Fuck, man. . .” camp when it comes to just considering it, much less what to do about it.

Honestly it feels weird rating this movie at all, given its relative importance and sinister implications (and between you and me it’s really more of a 2.5-3/5 on a technical level). But, whatever, it’s important to see so showing it some love via the website’s metrics is important too. I can understand people’s apprehension to approach this artifact, much less believe it. At the same time if you give this a low rating, you suck.

It took me a while to realize I’d heard of the Franklin scandal years before but had rejected it less critically than I’ve accepted it today. I’ve really nothing to lose by believing in this and given trends of the last few years, and it’s probably the right call that the world is, functionally, run by a bunch of rich pedophiles. Like if you’re into conspiracies this is the documentary to see. I don't believe every lurid detail involved in the Franklin scandal, but you absolutely don't need to twist my arm to convince me there are networks of these people who cover their actions through il/legal means. I considered the possibility that CoS is in itself a limited hangout but then my head started hurting.

I doubt anyone reading this review is part of the class of abusers exposed in the film, the rich and powerful who can inculcate themselves and their family from any repercussions of this behavior. And if you’re some random person reading this, why would you ever think the elite care about us, about you? Why would you tacitly endorse the class who’s stolen lives, land, money, time, and have even taken steps to manipulate reality to further their own goals of exploitation?

What do you even have to gain by disbelieving this “conspiracy?”

Better question: What, who, gets lost if you don’t believe it?

Resources on The Franklin Scandal

Stuff I consulted and consumed before and during writing this review:

Conspiracy of Silence

The documentary itself. There are different versions of CoS floating around online, with different colorizations, narrations and even footage, but this is the one I found easiest to watch. I believe it was a latter version of the original doc.

web.archive.org/web/20060714030056/http://www.franklincase.org:80/index.htm

Tag is fucked for some reason but this archived webpage provides a timeline of events, including monetary figures relating to the banking aspect I didn’t include. Spookily enough, the ‘Key Persons’ and ‘Key Places’ links are no longer accessible.

Subliminal Jihad

Subliminal Jihad has a superb two-episode (#26-27) deep dive into the scandal that’s rich in detail and analysis. They offer a far more nuanced and historical take than mine and also consult a number of resources I’ve linked to. Heavily recommended.

Interview with Nick Bryant from the International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation

Bryant’s book is the latest piece of major content regarding the Franklin scandal. Note the name of the institution that’s interviewing him.

John de Camp’s Obituary

Overview of the late politico. One thing that stuck out to me is that it explicitly refers to him and Schmit as friends but that also doesn’t seem like an out-there thing to write about political colleagues.

The Franklin Cover-Up

One final reiteration on my misgivings about de Camp but until Bryant’s book came out, this was the definitive recap on the Franklin scandal and hey, it’s free.

1988 New York Times article

Provides a good overview of the case as well as Larry King’s background. I believe this is one of the earlier pieces to’ve covered the scandal as it unfolded, and by my measure the most in-depth exploration in a major newspaper.

1989 Washington Post story on Henry Vinson

Fascinating background on an underexamined figure in this whole thing. Focuses on his escort service but Craig Spence features prominently.

Govcrime.Wordpress

This site has supposed transcriptions of some of the victims (as well as scans of official documents uploaded by Bryant though I’m not sure who the author of the site is), Paul Bonacci, and more testimonies.

CW: The PB debriefing is VERY graphic and filled with CSA/SRA and, like I mentioned at the beginning, the breadth itself is just staggering. I’d skip it entirely if you’re only curious about the big picture of this whole shitshow.

TheFranklinFiles

A now-barren message board that primarily served to be the stomping ground of a figure named Darron, who claims he was a victim of SRA. The site includes episodic recollections and even photographs of the locations Darron claims he was taken too (also a decent amount of right-wing anti-climate rhetoric, among other stuff, be warned). Even if the whole thing is a sham, the depth is impressive, like discovering an empty message board and making it your own. The last post was in 2011 but guests still lurk on the site. Apparently you can still register a new account. Not really useful, but interesting.

I apologize this list isn’t exhaustive but it is, I think, a good springboard to launch from if you’re interested in the Franklin scandal.

Anyway, fuck Larry King, fuck Alan Baer, fuck Peter Citron, fuck Craig Spence, fuck OPD, fuck the FBI, fuck the CIA, fuck Reagan, fuck the government and fuck America. I’m gonna go watch Bake Squad.

PS: Was that a Columbian or Russian or ??? flag flying at King’s property about 12 minutes into the documentary?

[amesstm]

s/o who is scared of spiders

Characters: Daichi, Kita, Kuroo, Oikawa, Bokuto, Terushima, Futakuchi, Ushijima

A/N: This is inspired by my terrifying experience with a spider last night. If anyone wants to know, spraying it constantly with B&BW fragrance sprays is very effective. Now, my bathroom smells like warm vanilla sugar.

✨Daichi✨ would hear your scream and immediately think it’s a home invader because he’s a cop. As he ran towards you, he’s glad he’s done all the exercising he’s ever had to do for this exact moment. Absolutely no one was going to touch you. “What’s wrong?! Are you okay??? Is someone dying??” He assesses the situation and immediately sees you pointing at a small spider in the corner. He’s completely stone-faced (with that look on his face whenever Hinata and Kageyama argued) because he got so worried over nothing; so, he starts to turn away. “Nooo! Please come back!” After much pleading on your part, he’d promptly kill it with a press of his shoe. Clean scene with no evidence. You’re still breathing heavily but don’t worry, he hugs you because you’re his baby. You may be embarrassed because you know that your fear is irrational, but he’s seen a lot of fear in his lifetime.

✨Kita✨ would be running because of the blood-curdling scream. Kita is usually calm, collected, and stoic, but he actually shows worry for the first time in his life. He notices how you’re curled into a ball with your eyes fixated on the mirror. His keen eyes immediately see what you’re freaking out about. “Please get rid of it, Shin!” Yeah, all the anxiety disappeared from his face and a relaxed demeanor replaces it. “It’s only a spider, it won’t hurt you.” “It’s hurting me spiritually.” Since Kita works in the fields, he’s perfectly fine coexisting with bugs so he’d walk past you calmly, pick it up in his palm, and show it to you. Of course, you yell in terror so he just releases it outside, a little farther away from the house. “It’s gone.” “You released it, didn’t you…” He’d nod nonchalantly. “What if it comes back?” “I’ll be here for you.” You sighed but smiled, unable to ever really be mad at him, “We’re making a pillow fort for defense.”

✨Kuroo✨ would be concerned because he’s never heard you scream like that before, not even with him. But as soon as this man sees that you’re freaking out over a spider, this man of science will rationalize that it’s not a threat. Of course, Kuroo would laugh at you at first, but then he’d educate you on why spiders are good for the environment. He would absolutely try his best to make you understand that the specific spider you were scared of at this moment was actually not dangerous whatsoever. He knows that you’d freak out with visual examples of harmless spiders, so he sticks to an audio lesson. By the end of his spiel, you’re okay with spiders. Kuroo would still be in a teasing mode as usual, saying, “I’m so proud of your character development.” You pout, “Can we still evict it, though?”

✨Oikawa✨ would probably hear your screams from across the house and think you’re being dramatic (as if he can totally judge you). So, he takes his time sauntering to you whilst you’re just hoping he’d hurry up. He would literally roll his eyes because it was probably over nothing. But as soon as Oikawa enters and sees the menace, he would scream just as loud and definitely possibly higher than you would. If you could handle his weight, he totally would’ve jumped into your arms at that moment. You two would stare at it from across the room, holding onto each other and crying together. “You kill it!” “No, you kill it!” If it moves an inch, you two are screaming again. Even the spider would be confused by the spectacle because all it did was exist. Meanwhile, you both contemplate relocating to Antarctica (aka the only place without spiders in the whole world). Instead of any drastic actions, you call Hajime to be the savior of the day. Unfortunately, you had to use Oikawa’s phone and Hajime let it ring.

✨Bokuto✨ is concerned at first - as he should be - but then he’d love the spider because it’s small and docile. His eyes would widen like an owl’s in wonder, creeping even closer to the little guy so he wouldn’t scare it. The large man would even pick the little creature up, much to your astounded horror. He also dares to get close to the spider in his palm, whispering, “Hey little guy, was my little owl scaring you?” You’d definitely be offended because it scared you first??? You’re in the corner pouting from frustration and betrayal, watching Bokuto admire it. Soon, Bokuto would absolutely be engrossed in a whole conversation with the spider as if it would reply, so he didn’t see you enter with a vacuum. Now he’s the one screaming because you killed his friend.“STUART, NO! He had a wife and kids!” “Okay, so?” Bokuto is in emo mode until you prepare a funeral for ‘Stuart.’

✨Terushima✨ is all cocky and arrogant when he tries to kill the spider for you. His signature smirk wasn’t even subtle or disguised as concern when he teased, “Awh, does my darling in distress need me?” Now you stop freaking out, opting to glare at him because you just want him to get rid of it. Your hand swats at him, causing him to tease you even more. He’d laugh at your expression and shoo you away with an easygoing smile, “Don’t worry, it won’t be a problem for you anymore!” You’re bouncing slightly in place as you anxiously wait for some relief. Little did he know it was one of those jumping spiders. So when it jumps to another location entirely, he jumps and screams from terror and confusion. Wild TERUSHIMA fled! You sighed in disappointment and promptly closed off that area of the house because your knight in shining armor refused to enter a rematch.

✨Futakuchi✨ would think your phobia is irrational at first, as most do. In fact, he wanted to tease you for it, but the look on your face melted his iron heart. A big pout rested on your lips and your eyes dropped in pure hopelessness. Now, he decided that the perpetrator should be eliminated as soon as possible for you to be happy again. He’d swiftly grab a tissue, kill it in one go, and flush it down the toilet. Let it be known that your phobia had always been made fun of, so your boyfriend killing it without any questions? Futakuchi would definitely notice the sparkling heart eyes you were making at him, so he’d chuckle, “Why are you looking at me like that?” With the most serious expression and tone you asked, “Can we get married now?” He’d chuckle and walk away, not taking you seriously. You’d scamper after him, whining, “No, no, I mean it! Come back!”

✨Ushijima✨ would be really confused by your fear. “Why are you scared of it?” His furrowed eyebrows and confused eyes weren’t mocking whatsoever. So, you knew he was genuine in his curiosity and confusion. After calming yourself down, you’d explain why spiders absolutely terrified you. While many considered your boyfriend to be dense - and to be fair, he was - but he knew the look of fear. He’s seen it with his opponents before. Silently, he just kills it for you. You breathe out in relief, “Thank you! How can I make it up to you?” He’d slightly pout, “Do I scare you like the spider?” Confused by his question, you tilted your head, “No. Why?” “Because you looked like my opponents.” You blinked a few times and began to laugh, “No, no, baby. You don’t scare me at all.” Afterwards, you make him lean in for a kiss, which he gladly accepts as reassurance.

A/N: y’all why did my autocorrect wanna write cow when I was writing Ushijima’s??? It knows bro.

©amesstm on tumblr // pls do not plagiarize, steal, or repost my content w/o permission!! BUT likes & reblogs are highly appreciated :)

[walks-the-ages]

Hollow/Arrancar!Marinette murdering and eating rich snobs and assholes regardless of them being shinigamis, humans, or other hollows... meaning: RIP most of the shinigami cast (you know, people like these bigots that torture & experiment on others and such) and Gabriel and more lol. that's it. that's my idea for a fic.

Actually Competent Hawkmoth AU where he easily defeats Ladybug and Chat Noir after the first few Akuma when he realizes he's better off doing it properly and teaming up with his Akuma to fight them in person instead of trying to do a battle of attrition against some 14 year olds when Akuma are not "designed" to be solo fighters, they're meant to assist the Butterfly wielder in combat.

easily overpowering them both with his enhanced speed/strength/stamina/endurance/etc as an Adult Miraculous user who can spam their power as many times as they want (which really begs the question of why Gabriel never does that in canon)

Anyways, Gabriel easily defeats Ladybug and Chat Noir after spamming his ability to make an army of akuma and fighting them physically in person in one-on-one combat because kids are not meant to be wielding Miraculous since they can't even use half the features of the power ups without running out of energy and time. Gabriel easily takes the Ladybug earrings from Marinette and has an Akuma kill her--

He's about to do the same to Chat Noir, but when he removes the ring and finds his own son staring at him in horror, he takes him prisoner instead

Adrien is actually truly kept prisoner, removed from his giant bedroom and tossed into an actual literal dungeon under the house while Gabriel fumes at his son's arrogance and "betrayal", needing time to decipher the Guardian's Grimoire because nothing happens when he unifies the Ladybug and Chat Miraculous and says "I wish x" , no matter how many ways he tries wording it or how many languages he speaks to activate the ability.

So Marinette dies in horror, terror, and rage at the hands of a Supervillain, and lives just long enough to watch her actual-competent friend and partner (instead of his usual liability incel) Chat Noir have his identity revealed as her (actual) friend and crush, Adrien Agreste as he's beaten down and then hauled away by his abusive father whose now also a Supervillain --

And she swears, that if there's an afterlife, she will stop at nothing to get revenge on Gabriel Agreste if it's the last she does.

There's a few weeks/months of Marinette, stuck as a Jibakurei, chained to the Agreste Mansion where she was murdered by Gabriel, forced to watch but be unable to intervene as Adrien is held prisoner and Gabriel continues his reign of terror across Paris, after realizing from the pictures in the Grimoire that there are more Miraculous than just the Ladybug and Black Cat, and that perhaps a third Miraculous is required to unlock the Wish--

Fu recruits more and more heroes to try to defeat Gabriel, but it's all in vain, the adults who are recruited (including Marinette's parents and Mr. Ramier) all are able to hold their ground against Hawkmoth, but they cannot overpower him.

Marinette's Chain of Fate erodes completely on the day she watches her school be demolished by an Akuma while class is in session.

[dreamsclock]

thinking about how c!wilbur admitted that he cried himself to sleep every night during the l’manburg days :(

this made me so so sad to write ,, c!wilbur is one of my favourite characters and his whole deterioration makes me MISERABLE ,,, if i’m not crying over c!dream or c!quackity you better believe i’m crying over c!wilbur (or all three LMAO

warnings: biblical references/religious references, self hate, unhealthy mindset, mental illness, crying, drugs mention, death, blood, war, violence

L’Manburg, Wilbur thinks, is like Heaven.

It hadn’t started off that way: a drug empire isn’t the most heavenly or biblically moral country, but it had changed over the months, grown arms and legs and a heart that manifested itself in Tubbo and a spirit in the form of Tommy. Wilbur is its head, pruning it into a tangible dream and leading the soldiers to victory, but he knows he’s not responsible for the change L’Manburg had undergone. Tommy had been, Tubbo had been, Fundy and Niki and Jack and even fucking Eret: Wilbur would have been content with running a drug empire. It would have been dirty, but fitting, because he feels dirty: L’Manburg is too clean, too pure, for anyone, much less him.

Because here’s the thing - Wilbur’s not an idiot. He knows his country is a pipe dream. 

Not in the literal sense - they fucking won the war, Dream had backed off and given them the land they wanted, and L’Manburg is, for the most part, an established country, with people and freedoms and peace and happiness, but it’s built on blood, blood and death that can’t be forgotten, no matter how much people want to. Tommy’s dead body rings clear in his mind, Eret’s betrayal, Fundy’s terror, Tubbo fighting someone far more experienced and ruthless than him-

Wilbur loves L’Manburg, he does. But he doesn’t love this version of it.

L’Manburg haunts him in his dreams and nightmares, an unattainable vision of peace founded on conversations he had never been successful in giving during the war, harmony and a clean history mocking him at every turn. L’Manburg is heaven, Wilbur knows, but he’s the snake, tarnishing it with whatever he does. 

He’s the snake in the Garden of Eden, and the longer it and he exist, together, they’ll destroy everyone inside the walls.

Vision blurry, eyes stinging, Wilbur stares down at his paperwork, stares down at the pile of papers and forms and official records he has to fill out. There’s no window open, no draught blowing in under a door or loose floorboard, but by God, he feels cold.

The clock chimes one in the morning. There are tears slipping down his face. He’s the snake, and L’Manburg is his Eden. 

Tyrant, he’d hissed in Dream’s face, watching the younger’s expression contort into surprise and anger, and now, he thinks maybe he’s not the tyrant after all.

He’s so, so cold.

[ninazeniks]

—  ATLAS AND ATHENA

genre: new adult / urban fantasy

pov: third person, present tense

themes + tropes: rivals to lovers, forced proximity, found family, war and rebellion, betrayal, very unreliable narrator, masks and the people that see through them, anti-heroes, grief, angels and wings and flying, complicated family dynamics, conspiracy theories, identity reveal, working through trauma, undercover shenanigins, spies and double agents, everyone has a motive and a side to the story.

status: outlining, first draft

wip page | wip tag

— SYNOPSIS:

an angel falls out of the sky. 

a girl is shot in the stomach.

a spy goes to an auction.

when a mission goes abruptly sideways, nina rhodes, agent and sharpshooter for the ambigiously named agency — a network of spies and espionage working on both sides of the law; good and evil, mortal and divine — is partnered with atticus sideris, archangel and member of the elite, dangerous themis guard, dedicated to preserving the order of the divine realm.

an order that is in jeopardy. ages ago, in centuries lost to the clutches of time, the divide between mortal and angel was impenetrable. eventually, over thousands of years, the bloodlines mixed, and angelic divinity seeped into the mortal realm, enough so that most ‘mortals’ have at least a modicum of divinity. archangels, those angels entirely pureblooded, live within the Aether, the divine realm literally above the mortals, with their own rule of law and a reaffirmed boundary.

a human rebellion was had. 

a truce was formed. 

the flames were not smothered. 

now, ten years after one of the greatest terror attacks on record, a human bringing down three of the infamous themis guard, someone is producing divine weapons, able to harm archangels, for mortal use. the issue — divinity makes mortals feral. combine that with a bioengineering company looking to genetically alter mortals to carry more divinity, and a second war is on the verge of erupting.

nina and atticus, mortal and archangel, are assigned to a task force to dismantle the weapons smuggling ring. but when nina unwillingly finds herself the target of another investigation, and atticus helpless to reveal the truth, they have to work backwards, finding the connection to themselves and their team, even as they try to keep their truths from each other.

— CHARACTERS:

nina “athena” rhodes. mortal. 24. sharpshooter turned spy. empathetic, bright, neurotic, stubborn, analytical.

atticus “atlas” sideris. archangel. immortal. commander. surly, reserved, loyal, protective, tormented.

manon moreau-popova. mortal. 25. assassin. cold, cunning, defensive, callous, evasive.

ismena dhaniels. archangel. immortal. enforcer. brave, afraid, passionate, intuitive, blunt.

reuel kovac. mortal. 27. liar. vindictive, relentless, charming, rash, self-serving.

taglist below the cut, ask to be +/-

general: @noloumna @kazino @incipientdream @mahalii @adaparkwrites @perditism

[mariinara]

TWENTY - TWO (Sam Drake x Reader) ANGST |PART 2|

A/N: Aaaand that's a wrap on this one, ladies and gents! This was all sorts of emotions rolled into a single one-shot but HEY it is what it is and y'all know how I am by now so :") HOPE Y'ALL ENJOY THIS ONE.

Tags: @easy-and-steady , @the-winchesterboys , @the-drakeboys , @missdictatorme , @psg-for-life , @elledrake , @samdrakeftw , @s4mdrake , @ghost-of-the-oldwest , @writersblockincoming , @purplezebra68 , @hrgnm

Request for anon: '14, 18, and 19 for angst prompts with Sam? 👀👀 I also really really adore your work!!!'

Prompts: "Can you just kiss me? One last time? That's all I ask.." + "Don't make this harder than it already is.." + "It's better this way."

Warnings: ANGST. Just ANGST, okay?

Word count: ~ 4.8K

(Part one here!)

-TWO WEEKS LATER-

Your fingers tapped away on your keyboard, your eyes flickering from the screen to your fingers as you filled in a resume for a teaching job in Boston. You wanted to quit your job in Philadelphia to spend as much of the summer vacation as you could with your mother. When she’d come back from Jersey, that is.. 

Avery was completely supportive of your decision and thought that you and your mother needed to squeeze some bonding time into your tight schedules. She wanted to keep her job in Philly, though because it paid pretty well and she wanted to gain her independence as quickly as possible, which Sam pretended to be proud of when it caused him severe anxiety, despite knowing fully how capable his daughter was. However, she was his only daughter and he liked when she counted on him for everything, but as she grew up, she became less and less dependent on him and it upset him to some extent but he hid it well.

Sam..

You couldn’t help but smile at the thought of him, your cheeks heating up as memories flashed through your head of that night. The images were so vivid that you felt the same sensations tingling you, causing every hair on your body to stand up and a shiver escape your parted lips and, suddenly, you were no longer focused on the resume and were only swimming in your pool of that night’s memories. God, it was so good. How he had no control over his actions. The look in his eyes that so clearly displayed his hesitation-- his debate on whether to take the next big step. And once you reassured him that it was okay and that he could do whatever he wanted, he took you hard and fast, his hand clamped over your mouth or his lips against yours to silence you and nothing in the world mattered at that point.

You inhaled sharply before chuckling lightly to yourself. The best thing about what happened was how you casually put your clothes back on and continued to play video games all throughout the night and laughing like nothing ever happened. To some women, that could’ve been a bad thing, but to you, that was the equivalent of cuddling. And he stayed charming and funny up until he passed out right next to you, which made you smile, pull a blanket over his body, and plant a quick kiss to his cheek. Next thing you knew, you were out of the shower and sleeping next to Avery, who was passed out and snoring softly like the heavy sleeper she was.

That was almost two weeks ago and you hadn’t seen or heard from Sam since you entered your empty home, but you didn’t question it. You reckoned he was probably busy with finding another gig with Sullivan. You and Avery called everyday, though, and she’d tell you how absentminded and distracted her father seemed. She’d be talking to him and he would be in another dimension and would snap out only when she alerted him, apologizing and asking her to repeat what she’d said before he’d do it all over again. She was complaining about it to you and you couldn’t help but wonder if that was a good or bad thing. For all you knew, you might’ve had him finally wrapped around your finger.. Or he was completely regretting what he’d done. 

Your cell phone suddenly started ringing, startling you out of your thoughts. You realized that you’d been staring at the blinking cursor aimlessly for the past ten minutes. A sigh escaped your lips as you reached for your cell on the nightstand, expecting it to be your mother checking up on you, but when you looked at the ID, you raised your brow. 

She usually didn’t call you more than twice a day and you didn’t know why she was calling again after you rambled on to each other for two straight hours but you decided to pick up with a smile: “Hey, Av--”

“(Y/N).” 

You frowned deeply at her tone. The way her voice cracked and the sniffles and little whimpers alerted you, causing you to sit up straight and push the laptop off of your lap, “Ave? What’s wrong?” You asked, causing her to let out a small sob, “Talk to me. What’s goin’ on?”

“It’s dad.” She croaked, her voice still broken. You found your heart sinking at her vague response and a million things popped up in your head, but before you could say anything, Avery continued, "He's going to Vancouver.." 

Your brows pulled together in confusion and you shook your head, "Wait, but– He travels all the time, Ave, what–"

"No, no, I'm goin' with him."

Your mouth snapped shut and you shifted on your bed a little so your legs dangled from the side, “H-Hold on, Ave.” You closed your eyes with a soft sigh, your fingers rubbing your forehead, “Slow it down for me.”

You heard her sharp intake of air and her shaky exhale shortly following, “Dad.. got a job in Vancouver and we’re gonna move there for a while.” 

Your eyes snapped open again and you felt your breath hitch in your throat, “What’s “a while”..?”

You heard a short pause on Avery’s end and your heart sank with each passing second. You were going to prod her to speak up, but what she said next almost made you double over: 

“A year and a half..”

Your blood ran cold and your eyes widened. And suddenly, everything around you started falling apart. Your whole being began to crumble. Your breathing started getting heavier when you asked yourself: 'If it's just work, why would he take Avery this time?' and you realized that he was probably planning on staying there for good and Avery knew it as well.

Your hand flew to cover your mouth to muffle a cry.

"I don't know what to do. He told me so suddenly and I pretended to be happy just because he seemed happy and I–" Avery paused to gasp for air, "Sully got him this job all of a sudden and he's been packing for the past twelve hours and–" She sobbed. The sound broke your heart to a million pieces and you wanted to just apologize to her. For all you know, you might've been the cause of what was happening. Maybe he wanted to leave because of you, "I dunno what to do and I'm runnin' outta time, (Y/N)."

You let out a shaky breath and squeezed your eyes shut, your jaw clenching as you cursed yourself before getting up to your feet, walking over to your closet, "It's okay; Calm down– I'll be here in a few."

"There's literally no time– The moving company came for our stuff and we're headed for the airport in a few."

You frowned, "Moving.. company?" 

"That's what I asked but he said that he needed everything in case the job took a little longer than he expected." She croaked and sniffled again, "I don't fucking know what he takes me for or if he's being an idiot on purpose."

"No– Listen to me: Your dad is not an idiot." You defended in a calm tone, "You shouldn't blame him for this; he, uh.." You stared down at your feet, biting down on your bottom lip in contemplation as you swayed back and forth on your heels and soles, "He–He hasn't worked in a while and he needs this, so just.." You looked up again, your shoulders slacked in surrender and your eyes glossy with tears, "Just see where this'll go.. You're all he has, Ave and he loves you so, so much." You slowly breathed out, not wanting her to hear how you were trembling– not wanting her to detect how you were one minute away from breaking down. 

You closed your eyes again as she spoke, letting your tears slip freely down your cheeks.

"I know." She sniffled, "He's been so strange and I feel like he's not telling me something."

At that, you mentally smacked yourself about three-hundred times in a row. It hurt you so deeply how you've betrayed her trust like that. And again, with your eyes closed, memories flashed before your eyes, but the narrative completely changed. 

Sam's groans and words of praise filled your ears, his chest hot against your arched back and his hand clamped over your mouth while you let out muffled cries. But you imagined Avery, standing there, watching you in horror, drowning in her tears, traumatized by the sight. And you made eye contact with her at that very moment, maintaining it, as if to taunt her– to highlight just how selfish you were. You imagined her staring back, betrayal written all over her face, her cheeks burning from the salty tears and her hand clutching her chest and her other covering her mouth. With one snap of Sam's hips, you were pushed over the edge and your vision blurred with white light, your brows furrowing and your heart furiously pounding in your chest as you let out a scream into his hand, but when your eyes readjusted, Avery was no longer there. And neither were her pictures that once filled every corner in the living room. They were white sheets in pretty frames. And the ones she had with Sam only had him in them. And somewhere, from afar, you saw your father, laughing as he sent you a wink and walked away from you, only to dissipate into thin air. 

"(Y/N)..?" 

You snapped out with a sharp inhale, your brows arched and your eyes wide with terror as your fingers ghosted your lips before you covered your mouth, hoping that she didn't catch that sound that slipped you. 

"You still there?"

"I-I'm here." You quickly replied, your hand dropping from your mouth to rub your chest, trying to ease the feeling of immense discomfort, "I'll be right at the airport, okay?"

There was a short pause and then, you heard him call out for his daughter, followed by a "We gotta go, baby!" and you didn't think it was possible for your heart to sink any more than it has, but it did. 

"Coming, dad!" Avery called back, her voice completely different, as if she hadn’t been bawling for the past hour, “I’ll stall him at the airport cafeteria, okay?”

You nodded, trying to catch your breath, “O-Okay. I’ll be right there.” 

“Hurry..”

“I will.” 

You quickly hung up and put the phone on your dresser before hurrying to put on anything. You opted for a hoodie and a pair of jeans, pulled your hair back with whatever hair band you could find into a low bun, slipped on whatever sneakers that were next to your door, grabbed your car keys and phone, and hurried out of the house, trying to keep calm so your drive there wouldn’t be a complete disaster. 

You wasted absolutely no time. You kept your eyes on the road, had a steady foot on the gas, but your chest bubbled with anxiety. The kind that made you let out a small, suffocated whimper from time to time. The kind that made your hands tighten around the steering wheel. The kind that made it extremely unbearable to listen to anything from the radio, which caused you to reach out and turn it off quickly. You rolled down the window after the light turned green, immediately speeding down the road, the wind ruffling the stray strands of hair that fell on either side of your face and drying the tears that rolled down your cheeks. Your eyes caught a sign that made you nervously chew on the nail of your thumb, your heart beat quicker, and your stomach churn with jitters. Your head was so empty and you were so fixated on getting to your destination that you haven’t even rehearsed what to tell Sam or Avery. 

You were filled to the brim with sadness, nervousness, and a tinge of anger. The street lights that rushed past you and the sound of the wind had a hypnotic effect on you. The sound of cars zooming by on the smooth asphalt put you at ease somehow. 

When you parked in the airport’s garage, you didn’t even pause to think about your next step. You were out of your car and running towards the entrance, pushing past families and couples, absentmindedly muttering ‘sorry’s and ‘excuse me’s, getting looks in the process. 

You were stopped at the first checkpoint at the entrance by a security guard, who thoroughly searched you while you looked ahead, getting on your tiptoes to look past his shoulder for the cafeteria, but your eyes only saw several ticket booths and passport checks next to each other. 

“Free to go.”

You closed your slightly open mouth and got to your feet, swallowing your nerves and flickering your eyes to look at the guard, “Uhh, excuse me, but is there a cafeteria close by?”

“There’s more than one, but--”

Your phone rang in your back pocket and you quickly pulled it out and checked the ID, letting out a shaky sigh before answering, “Sorry..” You mumbled to the guard, “Ave? Where are you?”

“We’re in Peet’s coffee and Tea.” She sniffled, her voice a bit above a whisper, “I’m in the bathroom but I’ll come back in a bit, I just, uhh..” She huffed, “I needed a little time for myself.”

“O-Okay..” You nodded, “I can wait for a bit..” You squeezed your eyes shut and pressed your lips together, dreading the fact that it meant you’d have time with Sam. Alone. 

“I love you, Sparrow.”

You nodded your head, smiling softly, “I love you, too, Salazar..”

The line went blank and you looked up at the guard with a sheepish smile, “Peet’s tea and coffee..” You shook your head, your brows pulling in confusion as you scratched your forehead, “Er.. Coffee and Tea..” He chuckled at that.

“Uhh, you’re gonna continue along this path and find east Terminal B. You’ll continue past Starbucks and the vending machine and you’re there.”

You huffed softly and nodded, “Okay, thank you. Thank you so much!” You ran past him and made it through the crowds of people, apologizing and mumbling your way through people, your eyes fixated ahead. The sign above your head displayed ‘Terminal B’ and your stomach did flips as you ran past Starbucks and the feelings that bubbled up in your chest caused you to slow down. It was only then that you realized how out of breath you were.

How unprepared you were.

Your hand reached up for your fingers to gently brush the silver, heart-shaped pendant around your neck, with the letter 'A' engraved in beautiful cursive. 

You looked down at your feet as you walked, your hand clutching the silver heart.

Avery had the same one around her neck, with the initial of your name engraved. You'd had those since you were fourteen, but never in your life did you feel like you didn't deserve her love or trust. 

Again, you found yourself at your destination, with no semblance of an idea of what you were going to tell Sam. 

The chattering noises around you started dying down and were replaced by your loud heartbeats as you stepped into the café, your eyes carefully searching for a familiar face. Normally, the smell of brewing coffee and cold club sandwiches would draw you in but at the moment, you felt like you were growing sick. 

You looked around a corner, scanning the tables, only to see couples sitting and talking, teenagers being a tad louder than the rest of the people around them, or businessmen, sitting along in their fancy Tom Ford suits and their open macbooks, sipping on their typical cold brew. 

You sighed, but didn't know if it were from relief or frustration and just when you were about to search your head for how to approach Sam while you turned on your heel to look in another corner, you bumped into someone much taller than you, causing you to stumble back with a groan.

"Fuck." You cussed lowly, raising your hands in defense and backing away, scared that the person might be holding coffee, "Jesus, would you–" Your eyes flickered up and the aggressive furrow of your brows melted into a mildly surprised arch as you blinked, your eyes softening.

Sam pursed his lips and pushed one hand into the pocket of his Levi's while the other rested at his side, fiddling with a fraying thread in the side of his jeans. His eyes wandered from yours for a second before he looked deeply into them and his shoulders sagged, "Hey, kiddo.." He breathed out, giving you a tiny, awkward wave.

You blinked again, taking in a deep breath and crossing your arms, "Hey." You responded, swallowing down the lump that formed in your throat, "Did you know I was coming?" You asked, your hand quickly flying to wipe a stray tear from your cheek before you crossed your arms again with a small sniffle.

"Yeah. Yeah, uh.." He looked down for a second, as if he was ashamed of something. And you knew exactly what, "I figured Avery would call."

Your brows pulled together and your lips trembled slightly, "Why didn't you?" The bitterness that you tried to hide to no avail made him look up at you with a frown. 

He knew where this would go. It was inevitable. 

Sam reached out for you, "Okay, let's just sit down for a sec–"

"No." You sternly said, flinching away from his touch. The raise in your voice caught some attention around you, making Sam sigh softly and retreat his hand, "I want to know why you're doing this.." You whispered, your voice laced with heartbreak and disappointment. 

"Doing what?"

"Escaping me..!" You responded immediately, looking into his eyes as you took a step towards him. He ripped his gaze from yours and shook his head.

"I'm not escaping anything." He let out a mirthless chuckle, "I am trying to provide for Avery–"

"Oh, spare me the bullshit, Samuel." You venomously replied, narrowing your tearful eyes at him, "You are a coward." Your arms unfolded so you could push him away, which did nothing but make him take half a step back from you, "You're a fucking coward–" Your voice got louder as the lump in your throat grew more unbearable as you pushed on his chest again. He was quiet but his jaw was clenched. When you went to push him again, Sam grabbed your wrists to calm you down, knowing that both of you would be escorted outside if anyone from management took notice of the scenario.

"(Y/N)–"

"Get– offa me." You yanked your wrists away and took a step back, staring at him with wide, bloodshot eyes as you wiped your nose with the sleeve of your hoodie, "Don't fucking touch me.." You croaked, pointing an accusing finger at him, "You are just like that fucker."

He paused to narrow his eyes at you, "What..?"

"You're gonna leave me just like he did!" You let out a broken sob, your shoulders shaking with every quiet cry that broke through you.

Sam closed his eyes and shook his head slightly with a soft sigh, "Sweetheart, don't make this harder than it already is–"

"Please, stop.." You begged weakly, "You used me. Do not talk to me about things being "hard" because while you have a fucking escape, I do not!"

He scoffed, offended, "I did not use you–"

"Then why are you acting like that?!"

"Because."

"Because what?!"

"Because!"

"Because what!?–"

"Because I have feelings for you!" He snapped, making your breath hitch in your throat. You took a step back, feeling a little unbalanced as you frowned at him. His nostrils flaring and his eyes burning holes in your soul, his brows pulled together.

"What..?" You sounded confused. Or maybe hurt. Did you hear that right? By the look on his face, you seemed to have heard it right. Did it make sense? No. Absolutely zero sense, "Why did you.." Your brains froze on you, the gears not spinning properly, just lagging at every dent.

He took a step to make up for the distance you made between the two of you, "And I don't want to feel like that.." His hands were on your shoulders, then your upper arms, his thumbs drawing back and forth in comfort, "I'm pulling myself from the equation because I do care for you.. If we stay around each other, Avery's gonna notice and you're gonna lose her. I know that for a fact.." He searched your eyes for something. Anything. But it still seemed like you were at a loss for words, your mouth hanging open a little. It made him smile softly, his eyes gleaming with the sort of warmth that brought you a feeling of safety, "I don't want us to get in trouble. This could cost us everything and it is not worth it–"

"But it is." You refuted, hopeful. Your eyes brimmed with more tears at his words.

"No, no– Sweetheart, listen." His hands quickly cupped your cheeks so his thumbs could wipe away your tears, "I.. am not worth it."

You felt a sting in your heart. One that your face slightly contort in pain, "Sam–"

"You deserve someone who'll love you unconditionally without being a threat to every single relationship around you, and.." He shook his head, trying to search for the right words, "I love you unconditionally, but you and I've been through enough.." He breathed out, "You should be comfortable with the guy you bring. You should be with someone to bring home to your mom. Not lead a dangerous, tiring lifestyle. You don't need that." 

God, you hated how right he was. It made you love him all over again. His sincerity and tenderness with you contrasted the rough touch of his hands that you leaned your cheek into, your face shifting into one of complete pain as you let out a small sob.

"It's better this way.." His own eyes began to gloss the more he blinked and it took you back to that same night when he was completely vulnerable to you, "Trust me, sweetheart." He gave you a warm smile, tucking your stray strands of hair behind your ears, "C'mere.." He pulled you into a tight embrace, his chin on the dome of your head and the side of your face pressed against his chest. You felt his hands rubbing circles on your back. Slow, comforting, very familiar ones, "And I'm me.." You felt his chest vibrate and his cologne filling your nostrils, "I'll always be me; I'm not him.." Your fingers curled to clutch onto the front of his red flannel shirt, your eyes squeezing shut as you cried quietly against him, "I'm never gonna really leave you." He pulled away from you for a second to look at your beautiful crying face that you used to make when you'd fall off your bicycle when he taught you or came back from school and straight into his arms when you'd have a rough day of bullies. It made him smile with a wistful sigh from his nose, "Not if you ever forget me." He flicked your nose gently with a teasing smirk, making you chuckle unexpectedly with a big grin. 

"Never." You replied, smiling up at him with that glimmer in your eyes and for a minute, it was only you two in the entire airport and it didn't matter how many eyes were on you. And there it was again.

That spark.

And again, your mind convinced you that he was leaning closer to kiss you, but you shook your head profusely, getting your vision straight before looking down at your awkwardly shuffling foot, "Can I, umm.." You clicked your tongue and scratched your cheek with your forefinger, clearing your throat, "Can I ask for a favor?" You mustered enough courage to look up at him, your hands clasped behind your back.

He shrugged a little, "Shoot." 

You bit down on your lip and your eyes traveled to his, "Can you just kiss me?" You quickly asked, afraid of wasting any more time before Avery would get back, "One last time..?" His shoulders fell and his eyes flickered to every corner of your face, as if he was mesmerized by you, thinking 'Oh, man..' at the angelic look on your face that he couldn't for the life of him resist, "That's all I ask.."

He let out a shaky breath and glanced around. No sign of Avery. He then looked back at you and reached out, gripping the front of your hoodie and yanking you forward, making you yelp and stumble a little, but he caught you with a firm arm around your waist, pressing you against him before capturing your lips in a soft kiss, relaying his utmost care and love for you. For a second you were taken aback but when it clicked, your eyes fluttered shut and you kissed back with a soft exhale from your nose. God, it felt so right. So good. 

It wasn't fair.

How something could feel so perfect but be so wrong in every aspect.

Sam slowly broke the kiss and the sound brought you back from paradise, causing you to slowly bat your lashes to adjust your eyesight, gripping onto his strong, muscular upper arms for support, "Oh, wow.." You muttered, swallowing thickly afterwards.

Sam let out a light, breathless laugh, still looking into your eyes. You smiled warmly up at him, wishing that you could take him and keep him forever, but it wasn't up to you.

His arm loosened from around you and his hand was now on your hip. When you backed away from him a little, his hand went back into his pocket and the lack of physical contact from him almost pained you.

"(Y/N)!" You heard Avery's voice, causing both you and Sam to look to the side, but before you could say anything, she ran into your arms, making you stagger back a little, "(Y/N).." She whimpered, her arms tightly wrapped around your neck and her face buried in your shoulder. Your arms slowly snaked around her and you held her close, closing your eyes. 

"Hey, Salazar.." You tried to lift her mood, your hands comfortingly rubbing her back. Sam looked down at both of you with a thin smile.

"I'm gonna miss you so.. so much." She breathed, her voice muffled in your hoodie, but you heard her loud and clear and it caused you to smile sadly.

"Hey.. There's still college.. And we'll video chat every day, okay?" You suggested, but your voice cracked with both uncertainty and hurt, "It'll be like.. like I'm right there with you." 

She nodded against you, hugging you tighter, "I love you, Sparrow.." 

"I do, too.." She pulled away from the hug to smile at you, tears staining her rosy cheeks, "So much." You returned her soft smile, sniffling a little. 

Sam's hand was on Avery's shoulder as he stood behind her, giving her a few squeezes.

'Flight to Vancouver in thirty minutes. Please head to Gate 15B.'

All of you looked up as the feminine voice broke through the speakers.

"Well.." Sam sighed, "That's our cue.." His eyes locked on yours and you pressed your lips and swallowed to prevent yourself from crying. Sam stepped forward and towards you, and again, you were in his arms and he hugged you close as you stood on your tiptoes, "You take care o' yourself, alright..?" Came his deep, raspy voice, making you feel safe again. But all you could do was wordlessly nod, afraid that if you talked, you'd cry again.

And as they walked away, stealing glances over their shoulder at you with smiles and small waves, you kept it together. 

You held your own until they disappeared in the large crowds of people, and suddenly, you felt hollow again, as if something sucked all air from your lungs, and suddenly, you hand was clutching your hoodie as if it burnt your very skin while you let out small sobs and gasps of air, trying to keep as quiet as possible. 

You squatted on the floor, not caring how many people stared at you or circumvented your body. You quickly pulled your phone from your back pocket and with a shaky hand, you dialed the only person you could think of and pressed it against your ear, trying to keep your emotions at bay.

Finally, she picked up, her sweet voice filling your ear with a gentle "Hey, sweetie."

"Mom.." You sobbed, "Mom, please come home." 

"Baby, what's wrong? Are you okay?!"

"Mom.." You sniffled again, your whole body shaking as you debated yourself on what to say, but if you kept it to yourself, you’d feel like you'd explode, "I need to tell you something.."

                                           __________________

[nalaomita]

author’s note - decided to edit and repost this because it deserves more love. nala’s story is about to unfold and i’m super excited to tell it. i would appreciate it immensely if you took the time to read !! love you friends x

SHE WASN’T MEANT to lie to him. in fact, nala wasn’t sure if she would be in a position where she was able to forgive herself for it. she had to do it, though - there was no way to possibly get around it. lord knows she tried. but, how else was she meant to protect everyone all at once when she knew damn well he would try and stop her?

there was a fatal flaw in her plan. not once had she thought to come up with any solid non-answers to the inevitable questions of where and how long - an alibi she should have fabricated before she even touched ground in pride rock. 

the only explanation for her hesitancy was the fear of breaching simba’s trust in her. whether he heard it from an outside source or from the stumble of her own lips, nala was certain that he would eventually find out that she had lied to him. after a journey of grief and acceptance, hope and then grief again, she had finally managed, somehow, to get him back on her side. he was her teammate again - her partner - and at the risk of losing it all again, this stability she craved ever since she ran into him eight months ago, she had told him when asked ( a little too flippantly ), “i don’t know yet. i figure i’ll let the day take me where it wants to go.”

when was it ever like nala not to have a plan? she could very easily chalk it up to something that had changed since they were kids, one of those things he simply had to relearn about her, but it was careless all the same. it was so easy to fall into a hole, digging deeper and deeper into her lies until she eventually wouldn’t be able to climb out of it anymore. she created this scenario where she went somewhere remote to self reflect, or a big city where the hustle and bustle would be a change of pace. it was an elaborate lie that was far larger than it needed to be. she just didn’t want him to ask any questions or find a reason to stop her - because she knew she would try to stop him had the roles been reversed.

nala’s conversation with nuka, matched with a slip of her brother’s tongue, had her on a plane before she could think much of it - maybe that was why her excuses to simba were so sloppy. mheetu told her that scar was in talks with maleficent - the threats here and at home suddenly parallel. no one knew what they were planning or when they could expect scar to cause a scene, but the situation was laced with a newfound terror unprecedented even for them.

what mheetu didn’t realize was that learning this felt like a betrayal nala thought she wouldn’t have to feel ever again. all this time, bordering a year now, was allegedly meant to keep her out of harm’s way. when she called out that she was given no good reason to leave, threatening to return more than a few times, she was only met with pleas from her mother to stay where it was safe. but why wasn’t mheetu forced to uproot his life? what was the brilliant plan behind sacrificing her ability to help for a false sense of security? all of those questions that swam in her mind for months on end became obsolete with the snap of her fingers, backed suddenly by a mountain of lies.

maybe she deserved that.

but, it wasn’t the first time that this was an obstacle nala has had to face. more times than she could count, she had been thrown in the ring without so much as a last minute warning and trusted to teach herself how to land on her own feet. but she couldn’t recall an instance where it had been prefaced with deceit; where she had to find out that she had been sitting unknowingly in the ring this whole time. there was a certain heaviness to this, knowing that if anything happened to her it would have been entirely preventable. that was the fuel that kept her going. motivation to prove everyone wrong.

this whole time she could have been working on the other side. she could have been planning to intervene, to keep watch, to do … literally anything other than prancing around acting as if an equally prevalent threat to that of pride rock wasn’t residing right in their backyards. she fought so hard for the safety of others and against those who stopped her from doing so. whether it was someone she respected, someone she was forced to pretend to, or a stranger on the side of the road - no one stopped nala omita from doing what she set out to do.

really, they should have been expecting her.

[rayshippouuchiha]

Merthur drabble

So this is the first time I’ve written something since I wrote a Gary Stue x Mary Sue kind of fic at age 11, so don’t judge it too hard ok?😅Also, it’s more a collection of ideas that spawned from the first one than a drabble, since I didn’t want to expand too much on it. Do tell me what you think please 😊

The idea was born over me wondering “since Merlin is immortal, even from physical wounds and poison, what would’ve happened if his magic was discovered by Uther and he’s taken to the pyre?”. Bonus points if you catch the reference to an episode in the later seasons of the show that I sneaked in there. This would take place right before Morgana goes to the druids the first time (meaning she is still mostly loyal to Uther, Arthur and Camelot). Maybe Myror doesn’t try to kill Arthur during the tournament but instead disguises himself as a servant and tries to do it when he finds himself alone with Arthur in a corridor, with Merlin coming from around the corner just in time to catch him.

Merlin is too far away and the knife was thrown from such close range that he can’t save Arthur subtly as usual, and is forced to conjure a magical barrier between Arthur and the assassin instead, while still in Arthur’s field of vision. Using the assassin’s moment of shock against him, Arthur is able to kill him but is then consumed by the feeling of betrayal and rage. He does what he always does when he wishes to see someone punished: he takes Merlin to Uther, initially expecting him to be merely banished from the kingdom on account of having used magic to save his life. Pretty soon, he realizes that Uther does not care in the slightest what the magic was used for, only that it existed, when he declares that Merlin will suffer the ultimate punishment for his treason: the pyre.

Arthur ardently tries to protest, of course he does, but it is already too late. There is no going back, and due to his strong feelings on the matter Uther confines him to his rooms, watched by half a dozen guards, so that he would be unable to help Merlin escape. He also decrees that he cares too much about a mere servant, and to teach him a lesson he will be forced to witness the execution himself

Merlin is taken to the dungeons, bound in cold iron shackles (or something similar), unable to access his magic to free himself, and is visited by Morgana.

She starts cursing out Arthur for his part in his fate, but he begs her to forgive him. “He’s an idiot”, he says, “but he didn’t mean for this to happen. He just thought that I had been lying to him all along, and he wanted me banished for it so he acted impulsively. We both know that if he had taken a moment to think he would have sent me away himself then changed his mind in a few days after speaking to you and Gaius. You didn’t see his face when Uther declared I was going to the pyre. Please don’t blame him”

Morgana then tries to tell him that she will get him out somehow, but he convinces her otherwise, since she already attempted to allow Tom to escape recently, and thus would be the main suspect. And besides, he is being too closely guarded for any escape attempt to succeed without the use of magic.

He explains that he knows she has magic, and begs her forgiveness for not helping her sooner. He suggests that she make up a reason for going on trips occasionally, and use that time to ask the Druids living nearby to teach her to control her powers. Finally, he grabs her hand, smiles sadly and says:

“You are the kindest, fairest lady I have ever known. Don’t let your fear and anger make you lose sight of that. I am honored to have called you my friend. And remember, never lose hope, because at the very least I will make sure my death reminds Arthur that magic is not always used for evil. He will change things once he is king, I know it. So have faith, milady. And protect that cabbagehead for me once I’m gone, will you? He gets into so much trouble, he’s gonna need someone at his back”

Morgana loses her composure and begins to cry, releasing heaving sobs while Merlin tries to comfort her. He tells her that it will be alright, and to stay with Gaius and Gwen the next day. He does not wish for them to see him die this way.

The next morning at dawn, he is taken before the stake where his “crimes” are read out loud. He is then tied to the stake and allowed to speak his last words. Merlin draws himself up as much as he can, and declares in a loud voice that he didn’t choose to learn magic, and was instead born with it, and in all his years he has never once used his abilities for evil. He proudly proclaims that he has only ever used his magic in service of Camelot and his lord, Prince Arthur. He killed the afanc and thus ended the plague upon the kingdom. He enchanted the blade that defeated the griffin. He defended Arthur from bandits and assassins from the shadows. He discovered the treachery of the sorcerer Edwin then used his own magic to reverse the spell that would have killed Uther. He killed the Sidhe Sophia and Aulfric before they could sacrifice Arthur’s life to return to Avalon. He took part in the forging of the blade that ultimately felled the wraith of Tristan de Bois. He convinced Anhora, guardian of the unicorns, to give Arthur another chance when he first failed his trials. He saved Arthur from the bite of the Questing Beast by offering his own life in return, then struck down the sorceress Nimueh when she attempted to take the life of an innocent person instead. He defeated the dark sorcerer Cornelius Sigan and his magical army, then sealed his soul away once more.

Once finished listing his deeds, he looks Arthur directly in the eye and says with a tremulous smile “Arthur may think of me as an underachiever but I’m quite proud of those accomplishments. I… I can die happy”

Incensed, Uther gives the order to light the pyre while a heartbroken Arthur is forced to watch, held back by two guards as he desperately tries to run over and free Merlin from his bonds. The fire ignites, and Merlin can’t help but scream. Arthur closes his eyes. Next to him, Leon turns away.

One hour passes. Then three. Then six. And yet, Merlin’s screams still ring out over the crowd. Many people, initially eager to witness the execution, now thoroughly regret coming. The screams, they reverberate in their minds, and those with family members around his age feel sick to their stomachs. No one in the world, not even the most heinous of criminals, deserves such a brutal, horrendous pain, and if his words before the pyre was lit are to be believed Merlin deserves this least of all. No one can understand. There is no wind to blow away the flames, no rain, and Merlin is clearly burning, yet he just won’t die.

Looking closely, it is apparent that something strange is afoot. Merlin has burns all over his body, his skin is red or blistered or charred black by turns. In some places, one can even see the white of his bone peek through his wounds. However, after a few seconds, the blackened skin seems to heal and turns pink once more, only to burn again.

Uther orders several of the guards to move forward, and use spears to end Merlin’s misery. They stab him in the gut, and Merlin’s blood dies the ground crimson. After a few minutes, Merlin’s screams cease and a sigh of relief sweeps through everyone present.

…

But it is not over. Soon, Merlin’s shrieks start anew, and one knight slits his throat in desperation. But to no avail. Suddenly, as the wound at his throat heals itself, Merlin’s cries restart. But they have changed. The ground shakes, and the sky turns black from countless dark clouds suddenly converging over Camelot as he loses control of his magic. And over the cacophony of noise from the thunder and the rumbling of the earth and the screams of the frightened public, Merlin can be heard…. Begging someone to please, please kill him.

Arthur weeps helplessly in the grasp of the guards. Uther is flabbergasted. He doesn’t understand what is going on, and thus is forced to call his resident magic expert to the scene. Gaius has to be dragged kicking and screaming before him, tears running down his face.

“What is it you want, your majesty? Isn’t it enough that you are killing the closest thing to a son to me, for the crime of saving your son’s life? Do I have to watch it happen as well?”

Uther forgives his insolence, just this once, and instead asks why it is taking Merlin so long to die. Gaius almost can’t believe what is happening, but ultimately explains that Merlin is called Emrys the Immortal by the druids, who say he is magic itself. He never believed this literally, having only thought they meant he is a being of unfathomable magical power, but it is now apparent that their words are nothing but the truth. Merlin can’t be killed, and continuing with this atrocity is only meaningless torture.

Uther agrees, and has Merlin taken into the castle. Arthur immediately frees himself from the stunned guards and goes after him, only to find him in the corner of one of the cells with his wounds slowly healing by themselves, crying silently while occasionally letting out heartbreaking whimpers. He is staring at the wall blankly, and doesn’t react at all when Arthur speaks to him. His mind wasn’t able to withstand the excruciatingly torturous experience, and has shattered.

Eventually, Arthur convinces Uther to allow him to keep Merlin with him, since he is clearly not a threat to anyone. After a while, Merlin stops making any sound and will only look ahead, unseeingly, only capable of following orders, completely unable to do anything by himself. Wracked with guilt, Arthur then does his best to take care of Merlin with the help of Morgana, Gwen and Gaius; feeding him, bathing him, dressing him, and comforting him when he wakes from night terrors in the middle of the night. Looking after someone who is essentially disabled eventually takes a toll on Gwen and Arthur’s relationship, and they agree they are better off as friends.

At some point, Arthur is attacked again and Merlin instinctively protects him with magic: this is the first action he has taken by himself since the pyre. Arthur breaks down into sobs, hugging Merlin close and begging him to say something, ANYTHING. Merlin doesn’t answer.

It takes many months, perhaps even years, but eventually with Arthur’s loving care Merlin does get better. His very first word after his ordeal is “Arthur”.

Arthur is so overwhelmingly relieved the first time Merlin makes a sassy comeback again that he falls to his knees in the middle of a council meeting. A panicked Merlin helps him to his feet, and Arthur uses his arm to pull him into a backbreaking hug. Merlin becomes Arthur’s most trusted advisor, and there is no threat they don’t face together.

In the meantime, his words before the pyre and the way he continues to protect Arthur, even in his current state, move the hearts of the people and obviously Arthur himself. Eventually, the protests in favor of repealing the ban on magic get so ridiculous, with so many people behind them, that even Uther has to concede defeat. Forced to face the truth about the nature of magic users and the reality of his actions against them, Uther health deteriorates from the stress and he confesses his mistakes to Arthur and Morgana, particularly in regards to what happened with Ygraine and Vivienne. It is a long time before either of them will speak to him again after that, and it takes almost until he is on his death bed. When he takes his very last breath, their forgiveness feels like absolution.

Morgana takes Merlin’s words to her that night to heart, and settles for being named an official princess once Arthur is king, and being given her very own stretch of land to lord over. She still spends much of her time in the castle, and once Merlin is back to his old self somewhat, she visits him often to practice magic, dote on Aithusa and share gossip. She eventually makes Morgause come around and she becomes Morgana’s most fearsome guard and protector. She is also given a place in court by Arthur.

Arthur names Merlin Court Sorcerer, and eventually their devotion for each other blossoms into a love so passionate, so fiercely protective on both parts that no one dares speak out against it. Gwen agrees to be their surrogate to create heirs to the throne, with loving support from her husband Lancelot. He and the other Knights of the Round Table accept Merlin as one of their own, and are almost as protective of him as their king. Soon, Uther’s supporters, magic haters and dissenters stop appearing.

With the entirety of Albion behind them, Merlin and Arthur bind their lives together in what is later called the wedding of the millennium.

As prophecy stated, together Merlin and Arthur usher in an era of peace the likes of which the world had never known, for both magical and non magical people. Once Arthur decides to retire, he leaves the kingdom in the capable hands of their first born, and then they leave to explore the world. They come back from time to time, of course, to check in, to share their wisdom, and they defend Albion with everything they have when called, but for the most part they just travel and revel in each other’s presence.

As their legend spreads throughout the world, people will sometime claim to have seen them in one place or another. Sometimes it’s true, sometimes it isn’t. And when Albion’s greatest time of need comes, they are there to face it. Together.

[cjrae]

Fear And Loathing In Los Angeles; Or, When did Lucifer forgive Chloe?

So, something that’s been sticking with me are questions that I’ve seen popping up around Tumblr looking for clarification about Chloe conspiring with Kinley and whether Lucifer has (or even should) forgive her.

Spoiler alert, if you’ve watched Season 4 the answer is yes, Lucifer has forgiven Chloe. However, I think there’s actually something to the argument that he doesn’t fully forgive her until the climax of 4x10. After all, Lucifer continues to throw Kinley in Chloe’s face multiple times throughout the back half of the season. That’s not dialogue of someone who’s completely forgiven the other person.

Others have pointed out that the whole point of 4x05 is to bring Chloe and Lucifer back together as partners and they’re absolutely right - there is a certain amount of forgiveness that happens within that episode.

The big question is; what exactly has Lucifer forgiven and when?

The Plot To Send Lucifer To Hell

Chloe’s betrayal of Lucifer is actually not her working with Kinley to send him back to hell. The fact that she doesn’t actually go through with the plan to drug him is irrelevant to the hurt that she causes. But, because it’s the physical action that represents her betrayal, it’s easy for the audience (and Chloe herself) to try to backpedal and say that she almost betrayed Lucifer, but in the end, she trusted her own judgment and put a stop to it.

There’s no doubt that Lucifer is hurt by the plan to send him back to the one place he’s spent so much effort to escape forever, but Kinley’s plan exposes the real betrayal - the fact that Chloe is terrified of him. Worse - that she pretended not to be and lied to him that she had processed seeing his Devil face and that “what I saw was my partner.” 

She gave him hope and then that hope was revealed to be a lie. 

Watch Lucifer’s face and body language after Chloe screams the line, “Because I’m terrified!” Before that he’s hurt, he’s angry, but he’s facing her and prepared to have this fight out. He’s willing to fight for their relationship until this moment. But that line is the betrayal. Because the poison that’s been introduced is fear - and that can’t be removed as easily as Kinley’s vial. 

That’s the moment he turns his back, unable to look at her except to finally confront her once more with incontrovertible proof of his identity after she tries to deny to him that he is the Devil. Cain’s words must be ringing in his ears at this moment. “Neither can you.” He’s been running from the Devil ever since his Fall.

But he can’t escape who he is, and the fact of the matter is that his past glee in “sowing chaos and destruction for his own amusement,” has grown into every awful story that has terrified Chloe – with good reason. Indeed, arguably the most famous of those seeds is going to show up in the final scene of 4x03, when Eve steps into LUX. 

Apologies

Ella puts her finger on Lucifer’s pain in 4x05 - that idea that Chloe doesn’t care about him anymore. After all, she certainly wasn’t acting like she cared in front of him in 4x04 - she flat out told him she didn’t actually need him, she used his help and then left him without the necklace he needed to fulfill his end of the deal. From his perspective, it must feel like she only wants him back to work when she needs something, like one of his vintage cars.

When Marco bursts into LUX, demanding to be given a chance to apologize to his ex-wife it is, as always with the procedural elements, symbolic for the apology that Chloe owes Lucifer. When Leona comes in and apologizes to Marco for ghosting him, it’s powerful - until the apology is proven false. Chloe is confronted with a mirror in the form of Leona, using what Marco desperately wanted to hear as a distraction to get close enough to kill him. And Chloe doesn’t much like what she sees.

Her apology in the famous ax scene of 4x02 is important for her (and her realization that Kinley is wrong), but it doesn’t actually address the hurt that she caused because Lucifer had no idea what she was actually apologizing for. The act of throwing herself between Lucifer and the anticipated explosion serves the purpose, even as she ostensibly says “I’m sorry” for hurting him by landing on top of his wound.

Through the show we’ve seen Lucifer literally die for Chloe - this is the first time that she actively proves to him that she would do the same for him, without hesitation, since knowing exactly who and what he is.  It’s the ax scene in reverse. Ella’s lines echo in parallel to Lucifer’s declaration;

“You two care about each other so much! What do you need her to do, take a bullet for you?”

“And I would do it again. And again. Don’t you know that, Detective?”

The core of their relationship may be a raw, exposed nerve right now, but it’s still there and intact. Having proof that she still cares that deeply is enough that Lucifer can forgive her for her direct actions in response to her terror - actively considering hurting him and lying to him.

But that amount of forgiveness is only enough to rescue their partnership. The core betrayal – her fear - remains.

Diet Devil

The second half of the season opens with Lucifer tearing himself in two in order to keep Chloe from being frightened. 

Eve is absolutely right when she points out that Lucifer has been holding himself back, just mistaken about his motives. She conflates the self-restraint Lucifer has learned with his simmering resentment at Chloe only being able to accept the pieces of him that she views as “good” - resentment that finally spills over when Lucifer confesses to Chloe that he’s the one who broke Julian’s back. 

Lucifer has spent months being patient, careful, considerate and feels like he’s barely treading water. In 4x07 he confronts her with the Devil at his coldest and most cutting, not caring anymore whether he scares her. He dares her to reject him again so he can finally snap the tension and drown his pain and self-loathing in the Devil that Eve is encouraging him to be. 

This moment is the turning point for Chloe. This is the moment that she sees Lucifer at his absolute worst - wrathful, vengeful, seemingly proud of what he’s done and absolutely daring her to criticize him for it.

Instead of crumbling against his resentment and anger the way she would have at the beginning of the season, she stands her ground. Lucifer is the one who flees back to his penthouse with Eve to “plan” Tiernan’s punishment, already stalling in the face of Chloe’s disappointment in him.

Chloe Decker, a “nobody,” holds the Devil to account with no power except her faith in Lucifer’s conscience. 

By the end of the episode, her faith is justified - and she’s finally capable of confronting Kinley on her own, no longer frightened and lost, but secure in her faith that Lucifer is a good man - which she throws in Kinley’s face. 

Once again, Kinley attempts to use fear to bring Chloe back into line by telling her about the prophecy, appealing to her best instincts to protect others, the corner of his mouth twitching in an aborted smile when he sees her respond to “Lucifer’s first love,” knowing that he’s succeeded in frightening her.

Except this time Chloe goes straight to Lucifer to confide in him.

Lucifer himself doesn’t quite appreciate this at the time because seeing her afraid at all rubs him the wrong way, as does the fact that she tells him about going to see Kinley after the fact. His own fear swamps him, encouraging him to be sarcastic and her throw her complicity in the plan to send him to Hell in her face as a visceral way to remind her not to trust Kinley. While he’s forgiven her actions, Kinley himself has become a symbol of Chloe’s fear of him, which he has not yet forgiven.

In fact, I’d argue that it’s not possible for him to forgive Chloe yet because the offense is ongoing. We the audience can see that she IS conquering her fear and re-learning who her partner is from the ground up – every part of him this time. But acceptance is an ongoing process and Lucifer is far from objective on the subject. 

Where Is My Beast?

If 4x07 is where Chloe sees Lucifer at his worst, 4x09 is when she confronts the monster. As each individual piece of Lucifer transforms, Chloe handles it, not with perfect calm, but by confronting and conquering her fear to focus on helping Lucifer – and proving that she does know exactly who Lucifer is, responding to the question that was put to her in the previous episode with actions, not words.

At no point does she kick him off the case, despite him falling into his usual pattern of projecting his issues onto it or the fact that his transformation is becoming increasingly difficult to hide.

Instead of letting him brood in his penthouse, she arranges a masquerade party for the sting so that Lucifer can go downstairs masked when his Devil face inevitably pops out because she knows just how social Lucifer is and that being alone will only make him spiral down faster.

When he loses control of his mojo and the masquerade at LUX turns into a nightmare, Chloe is there to take control, shepherding Lucifer to safety while also having the presence of mind to keep her ear to the ground for the case and asking the question “Why did you desire...” when Lucifer is unable to make eye contact.

When Beth verbalizes Lucifer’s own self-hatred, his Devil face is fully out - and while he walks behind Beth’s back, Chloe watches him without a hint of fear - only concern. 

The full transformation DOES shock her, and she has trouble looking at him - and that’s by design. His full transformation is designed to shock and terrify anyone who looks at him, including demons. The camera is very careful to watch Chloe’s face when Lucifer steps out, fully transformed. We see her eyes widen in horror and she takes a step back before looking away (echoing the initial fight in 4x03), before focusing on how she deliberately looks back at Lucifer when he says “I’m poison to anyone who dares to care about me. And especially you.” 

This is where the traditional Beauty and the Beast recognition of the man and the beast being the same person has been shuffled and flipped on its head. Chloe’s been struggling to reconcile what has felt to her like the two opposite sides of Lucifer’s personality – the good man (angel) that she knows and the monster (Devil) that is lurking underneath. This is the moment that the two sides merge for her – when she realizes that the beast is a manifestation of Lucifer’s declared self-hatred. 

What does she do? The exact opposite of running away. She goes after Lucifer. She’s able to use her own journey to acceptance to help him start down the path of his own. This is the first moment they both begin to reap the fruit of the season’s emotional labor. Lucifer’s revelation that he doesn’t want to be trapped in this destructive cycle anymore allows the Beast to melt away, revealing the man underneath to Chloe and finally allowing Lucifer full control over his body.

The Vial Reappears

The pure joy that Lucifer exhibits in the beginning of 4x10 is just as much about Chloe having demonstrated that she won’t run away from the monster as it is his overly optimistic hope that wanting to forgive himself is the same thing as actually doing it. Which is why he’s so startled when he seems to run smack into the exact same issues with Chloe that’s been plaguing them all season – and in response, backslides.

Chloe seems to care enough to face her fear of the monster, but Lucifer can’t bear her pulling away in the aftermath. So, he promises her that she’ll “never have to see anything monstrous ever again.” He shoots down her idea to bring Dan and Ella into the loop because of how long it takes to recover (or not recover) from that kind of revelation, making it utterly clear to Chloe that he believes that he’s damaged her permanently.

Meanwhile, Chloe’s had a better bead on the threat that Hell represents since she heard Kinley’s prophecy. Where Lucifer used the prophecy as an excuse to break up with Eve, Chloe has put the pieces together and recognized that if;

a.) The Devil is a good man and b.) demons could potentially roam the earth then, c.) what logically follows is that the Devil would have to do something about it.

The Devil is no longer a threat because he’s a monster. The Devil is a threat because it’s the title of the responsibilities that could take Lucifer away from her.

Of course, Chloe is terrible at articulating all of this. No one can blame Lucifer for interpreting the scene at the penthouse as Chloe’s fear of him once again coming to the forefront, even as she tries to backtrack and say what she actually means. In trying to protect him, she’s ripped open the old wound.

Once again, she’s been keeping something important from him, working on her own instead of with him as her partner and, once again, Kinley is the cause.

At this point, Lucifer’s had it. Even in expressing his irritation there’s fatigue and resignation - he’s given up and accepted that Chloe doesn’t want to handle the monster and that she shouldn’t be forced to do so just to satisfy his own need for acceptance.

The fact that Lucifer has kept Kinley’s vial hidden in his safe all this time is symbolic of the fact that he hasn’t finished letting any of this go yet. He’s got a perfectly good explanation for why he had it, but it’s a kernel of poison hidden deep within the heart of his home. A hidden reminder to him that even the person he loves most could turn on him. And, just as symbolically, it’s ripped out of his home by force.

Kinley’s plot to send Lucifer back to Hell has come full circle and now threatens a baby – the definition of an innocent victim. There’s no more avoiding the subject; Lucifer needs to know exactly what the full plan was to send him to Hell and how he phrases it is interesting – his tone is accusing, but he uses the past tense. “Back when you wanted me in Hell?”

This is the first time Chloe defends herself. “Well, as you know, I didn’t go through with it.” Pointing out to him that by the time he found out about the plot, she had already abandoned it, recognizing that she was wrong.

It doesn’t really buy her any quarter, now does it? The expression on Lucifer’s face never changes because the roofie was never the real issue. But, with the vial gone, he’s able to acknowledge that the incident is in the past and confront it head on with Chloe to save Charlie.

Forgiveness And Acceptance

It’s not until Chloe abandons all thought of common sense or good timing, going in to check on Lucifer (despite him telling her explicitly to say outside), with the two symbols of her fear literally behind them – the vial on the altar and what’s left of Kinley – that they come full circle.

“I don’t want you to see me like this. I know it scares you.” His voice is harsh, still shaking with battle adrenaline and terror, his body language braced for rejection.  

Finally, Chloe is able to spit the truth out - and is immediately called on to prove it. The actual monsters are swarming them and the only thing that can save them all is an even bigger monster. This isn’t Lucifer transformed in the penthouse, where he’s doing his very best to not threaten her, his voice still perfectly familiar and dripping with self-loathing.

This is the first time Chloe sees Lucifer as the King of Hell in the moment he reclaims the title.

His wings are outstretched to intimidate, his voice booms with the power to instantly command his subjects to kneel leaving him completely unrecognizable. He can’t afford to focus on her in that moment, but the camera can.

She’s NOT calm. Her eyes are wide, she’s gasping slightly and she’s trembling. But she does not look away – her eyes stay RIGHT on him until she sees the demons obey and she glances around as they fall. Then she looks back and she sees Lucifer, staring at her, his heart in his throat.

This time the question, “Can you accept me like this?” is silent. And so is her answer – her mouth closes, she stands up straight and she smiles at him.

She’s proud of him in that moment. And her pride in him reinforces his own pride. That tiny nod he gives Chloe at the end, when she’s not just declared that her fear is gone but proved it? That’s the moment Lucifer forgives her entirely. Because that’s the moment she’s made the only restitution Lucifer would accept – her own acceptance of him.

So, Your Point?

Forgiveness and acceptance are major themes of Season 4 and they’re not easy to achieve, nor can they happen in a single moment. One of Lucifer’s biggest mistakes of the season is trying to force the issue of his identity with Chloe.

Forgiveness requires not only the recognition of wrong, but also action to be taken to address the cause of the offense. It is an active process, not a passive gift that can simply be given out as a reward for good behavior.

Acceptance, like forgiveness, is also an active process that can’t be rushed. Neither Chloe nor Lucifer receive the rewards of their emotional labor until the very end, when they have both forgiven and accepted each other as they are. Lucifer finally receives Chloe’s love and Chloe finally sees Lucifer’s angel wings. It’s bittersweet, but earned.